


Bishop Takes Knight

by EinahSirro



Series: Bishop Takes Knight [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Spooks | MI-5
Genre: Alternate Universe - BDSM, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Bottom John Watson, Dark Lucas, Lima Syndrome, M/M, Rape/Non-con Elements, Russian prison, Spies & Secret Agents, Stockholm Syndrome, Top Lucas, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-12
Updated: 2015-10-13
Packaged: 2018-04-26 00:43:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 31
Words: 45,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4983256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EinahSirro/pseuds/EinahSirro
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lucas North is turned by the Russians, after eight years in prison, and becomes an interrogator. The Russians have picked up Dr. John Watson, believing him to be MI-6, and involved in deep cover operations. Of course, he is not. Of course, Lucas knows it. </p><p>And at one level, Lucas wants to save his fellow Brit, especially given that Watson is an innocent. But on another level… doesn’t the universe owe Lucas North a little something? After all these years, after all this pain? A prize? Yes. A prize. Something of his very own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Having Been Taken

John Watson was dressed in stale, sweaty prisoner’s scrubs. Had been for days. He sat in the small, brightly lit cell, and listened to the drip of the water... somewhere. It was loud, and it was near. It plopped. It was the auditory equivalent of Chinese Water Torture. He wondered if it was deliberate. It didn’t seem like it. It seemed just another sign of the forlorn and decrepit condition of his prison.

His cell was about eight feet by ten feet, with a bright white florescent light at the top. The walls had been painted white years ago, but apparently, under the white layer, was a light, institutional green. And the chipping paint revealed that under the light green was a deep burgundy. By picking at the thick layers of paint, John found, the original color was light blue. The walls were very damaged. Years of desperate fingernails had created the effect of a weird map. 

Sometimes John lay and stared at the walls, imagining they were the topographic map of some alien planet. There were coral reefs of acid green and burgundy under the thick, white, chipped-off surface. The white paint was shiny and always damp with moisture. But the paint chipped away to create… the Martian Indonesia. A Venusian Hawaii. Jupiter’s Bering Strait over there by the door.

John had been in custody for 8 days and had spent it in solitary. Meals were delivered twice a day, and clearly they were worried about him being a bit too plump, because… well, the meals were sparse.

The cot was thin but not unlike those he’d slept on in the military. There was a metal chair nearby, and the tiny sink was a separate entity from the toilet, so John counted himself lucky. This was the Holiday Inn of Russian holding cells. They even let him have a little plastic razor to shave his face with. And soap.

He shouldn’t have even gone to Russia. Doctors Without Borders was quickly turning to Doctors Without Any Diplomatic Protection at All.

All he knew was that a bomb had gone off near the border of Chechnya, and four hours later, the hotel he was staying at was raided by Russian secret police. He was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Yes, that was exactly the situation.

 

* * *

Lucas North, also dressed in prison scrubs, stubbly, his black hair falling in his eyes, sat in a small conference room with his handler, Mischa. Mischa was undoubtedly not his real name. 

The walls were covered with padded panels of a thin, tweedy material. There was a conference table with padded office chairs drawn up around it. There was a large flat screen mounted on the wall.

Lucas sat with the sour, gangster-faced Mischa and regarded the screen. It was a split-screen, displaying the feed from four different cameras. All four cameras were trained on a prisoner in a holding cell. Each one was a different prisoner, that is. 

Because the Russians had picked up three known MI-6 agents, and a possible sleeper.

“We think you’d be the right per-son to help, if you will…” Mischa said in his heavy-tongued English. Russians all managed to make English sound so ponderous. Lucas wondered briefly if their French was so weighty. It must be, surely. But French seemed so specific, so light… it was hard to imagine anyone corrupting it. Yet, Russians seemed to bulldoze everything they touched, he mused.

“Not that we doubt de sin-cer-it-y of your commit-ment,” Mischa said with straight-faced amusement. Lucas gave him a straight-faced eye-smile in return. He knew he looked seedy. Hadn’t shaved in three days. His prisoner’s scrubs were stained and rumpled.

But this was his chance.

“Which one do you want me to take?” He asked, all polite British helpfulness.

Mischa gave a Baroque shrug, and then fell to watching Lucas closely.

Lucas looked over at the four poor bastards on the screen. Every one of them was going to die a nasty death, he was certain. And he had to choose which one he’d participate in, to show he’d really “turned.”

Turn here, turn there. To everything, there is a season. Turn, turn, turn.

 _Turn away from it all and fuckin’ run, that’s what,_ he thought.

But first, there were certain necessary procedures. And every one of these poor stupid fools had, like him, signed up to be a human sacrifice.

Well, all but one. The “Sleeper,” please. Doctors Without Borders wasn’t… okay, actually, it could be.

Lucas looked at the grainy video feed of the man in the fourth cell. He sat patiently, the light shining down on his tidy blond head. It was probably the blond hair that did it, Lucas thought later. That, and he was smaller than the others. And a bit older. And he sat so stolidly, so patiently, his head bent but unbroken. _There's some corner of a foreign field that is forever England,_ he thought sentimentally. 

And it had been so long since he, Lucas, had been home. So long.

He watched as John Watson sat there all unknowing under the camera, representing everything Lucas North missed, and wanted back.

John Watson could be his ticket home, he told himself. 

“I’ll take the Sleeper,” Lucas said, leaning back and looking over at Mischa. “I know the type.” That was a lie. But one lies to Russians. It’s a matter of survival.

“But he can’t know I’m a prisoner,” Lucas added confidently. “I’ll need clothes.”


	2. Torturer's Prep

It was twenty-four hours later that Lucas was escorted back to the conference room and given his new persona. Clothes. Rooms upstairs. Keys!

“How much time do I have,” Lucas wanted to know, pulling the black turtleneck over his primitively-tattooed torso. 

Mischa gave another of his elaborate shrugs. “Nothing is pressing,” he admitted. “The Prime Minister will not even ac-know-ledge that we have any of his people.” 

This was either good or bad, Lucas mused, threading the black belt through the dark pants they’d given him. Either something was going down that was worth the abandonment of three agents and some poor sap in a non-profit, or that bomb near the border had been the point, and this seemed unlikely. Just another explosion in a market place. Oh, bigger than usual, perhaps, but…?

What? A warning sign to say, “We could do this again if you don’t lay off Syria?” Or “We’ll stop funding the Chechens when you stop funneling to insurgents in Saudi?”

Lucas shook his head. He was eight years out of the loop. There was no point trying to figure out Downing Street now. He hadn’t understood them in 2007.

Better to focus on the immediate: what would it take to convince the Russians he’d turned? What would make them want to put him in “the field” … that is… set him free? Well, he knew what: breaking John Watson. Destroy a fellow countryman and the Russians will trust you enough to send you off to betray the rest of them.

Presumably.

And what Lucas wanted to know was: who was breaking the other three? Because in the end, that was the competition. Just focus on where you are now.

“Who has the others?” He asked, in a bold move. Honesty was good bait. You offered a little honesty to Russians, like bread wrapped around a hook for carp.

Mischa gave a crooked smile. “Anton, Sergei, and Oleg.”

Lucas tried not to wince. _Poor fucking bastards, Jesus._ They’d turned the other three over to professionals. The Italian was a longtime interrogator. His _porosnoki_ usually died, often suicides. Sergei was just a garden-variety sadist, no finesse. And Oleg, well. Oleg would fuck up your brain. He knew that from personal experience. 

Suddenly he was very glad that at least one of them, John Watson, was in his hands.

But if the others squeezed any kind of information before he did, Mischa might decide that interrogation wasn’t his strong point. Then he’d hand Watson over to one of them, and Lucas’s chances for freedom went pop.

And the bitch of it was, Lucas was pretty damn sure Watson knew nothing. The other three, he recognized. One by sight and two by reputation. They really were MI-6. They really had secrets to be dug out. They were trained for this.

John Watson, from what he saw in the file, was just an Army doctor who had volunteered for DWB and now was in so far over his head, he’d have to look up to drown. 

Lucas North went into the bathroom by the conference room and looked at himself in the mirror. His skin was oily. He splashed hot water on his face and dried it off, and slicked back his shiny black hair.

Mischa appeared in the doorway. “May-be pinch your cheeks for a bit of color?” He asked ironically.

Lucas shot him a look. He’d be on camera the entire time, every time, and he knew it. Every session with John Watson would be recorded.

“So, what do you recommend? Do I be a sympathetic countryman, or should he think I’m an extremely well-educated Russian?”

Mischa lifted his hoary gray eyebrows. “Oh, you have thought this over.”

Lucas’s shrugs were more Gallic than Mischa’s. “I could be anyone you want me to be. Should he think I’m trying to help him or should he be trying to turn me?”

The old Russian gave an unwilling smile. “You are too cle-ver for your own good, Lucas. But you think you could be a Russian for John Watson?”

Lucas mimicked Mischa perfectly. “I think I am cle-ver enough to be a Russian for John Watson. I will be… the Russian who wants to be English.”

Mischa nodded appreciatively. “Is good. Your wife, she was Russian, yes?”

Lucas stared at him, and then looked away. “Yes.”

There was a silence, and then Mischa said jovially, “You like your new rooms, Lucas?”

Lucas inhaled and nodded, cracking his knuckles, getting ready to meet John Watson.

Mischa’s cynical old eyes regarded him calmly. “You like having keys again, yes? It’s the lit-tle things, I always find. Is nice to have keys in your pocket, eh?”

Lucas nodded, not looking at him.

“Well, so,” Mischa finished. “You know the pro-cedures. You have been through them yourself. The guards know your new position. You have access to all the rooms but you have to ske-dule them.”

A chill ran down Lucas’ back at the banality of evil. You can waterboard John Watson. You can torture him with electric shock. You can chain him to the ceiling of a concrete room, and beat him with a baton or a crop. But you have to check the schedule, because Sergei might be waterboarding someone else on Monday and it would just be awkward for the prisoners to see you two arguing over who gets to use the room.

He wondered if Oleg had scheduled his own interrogations with Lucas. Of course he had. _We’re going to have a session today, Lucas._ (Translation: I’m sorry you’ve been alone for two weeks, but Sergei signed up for the waterboards in advance, and the generator for the electric shock unit is down because our union maintenance workers haven’t processed the request form yet.)

He gave a snort of disbelief at… the world, and his place in it. This whole fucked up globe. Then he took a deep breath, remembering his own induction. There was a procedure. There was a goal. The goal was NOT gathering certain information, because the value of the information was never static. What was valuable was the relationship between the interrogator and his _porosnok._ The prisoner must find a way to relate to his interrogator. The interrogator must leave a path for the prisoner to follow. 

Lucas had already set upon his hook. He had John Watson’s file, a set of keys, and a plan for them both. 

It was time to begin. One had to make a first impression.


	3. Meet Your Interrogator

When the guards came to John Watson’s door, he stood alertly. He knew already this was not a meal delivery. For one thing, there were two guards. For another, he heard keys jangling.

The metal slide on the viewing port snapped open with a graceless clank, and a guard glanced in at him. Then the door opened. 

The guards, young men--rather loutish types--gestured for John to offer his wrists for the cuffs, which he did. Only when his hands were secured before him could he leave the cell, and he complied. The passageway outside offered slightly fresher air than his cell, and he inhaled gratefully. He didn’t bother asking questions. They never answered.

John was led down a hall that managed to combine brightness with dinginess. The lights overhead shone relentlessly down on the green tiled floors, black with dirt along the edges, and the chipping, moist white paint that seemed to personify this section of the institution.

Their path was long, and involved stairs going down. This was never a good sign, going down stairs, John decided. His cell was already slightly below the ground, he knew this from the one tiny high-set window that was barely above the dirt outside it. He supposed he should be glad, because it was late summer and basements were cooler, but going down more stairs suggested dungeons and torture.

They went down two levels and now John really did feel as though he were in a basement. It was positively chilly. The walls weren’t painted down here; they were just bare concrete. The guards led him to a room at the end of the hall. Every step of the way, John took wry notice of the clever ways it was threatening. The fact that the room was at the end of the hall, for instance. Nothing ominous there, no, not at all.

He stood patiently while they unlocked the heavy, metal door and nudged him in. Then the door shut behind him.

The contents of the room took only a split second to absorb, because it was all so simple. Concrete walls, ceiling, and floor. Florescent lights, but not in the ceiling. They were actually low in the wall, inset near the floor and shaded, giving the room a futuristic glow. Much more modern than the WWII era cells above. There was a metal table in the center of the room, with two chairs. There was a two-way mirror in one wall, letting John know that he and his interrogator could be observed.

But most interesting was this: a man all in black was sitting calmly at the table, waiting for John.

The interrogator looked to be late-30s, about his own age. He was very pale, and his hair was black and shiny. It was slicked back but some of it had decided to kick free and hang down over his brows. His eyes were large, deep-set, and heavy-lidded. His nose was sharp: a beak. His lips were thin but not mean. His physique was fit, and on the lean side. Even sitting down, he looked tall. Over six feet, John was sure. Being short, John had learned to size other men up quickly.

The interrogator regarded John patiently and waited for him to come and sit down. After glancing around a bit, and trying to decide if there was anything to be gained by refusing to come and sit down, John finally decided to come and sit down.

The interrogator had a file at his fingertips, and John was sure it was about him. There was a ring of keys on the file. There were two bottles of water, unopened.

“You are Doctor John Watson,” the man in black said, in English that carried the slightest trace of a Russian accent. His face was not particularly forbidding or threatening, or at least his expression wasn’t. But his features were … not soft.

John exhaled and looked at him, not feeling very friendly. “Yes.”

The other man nodded agreeably. “My name is Lucas Starkov. I would like to ask you a few clarifying questions, if I may. Would you like a bottled water?”

John brought his cuffed wrists up and took one of the bottles, and then had trouble opening it.

“Oh, I am sorry, allow me,” Lucas said, leaning forward to take the bottle from John’s hands. In doing so he allowed his own hands to touch the other man’s quite casually. When the water was opened, he handed it back to John and sat back. Lucas took the other for himself, opened it, and brought to his lips. He didn’t actually drink any of it, however.

John, however, drank deeply, gulping half of it down in one go. 

Lucas watched him, knowing now for sure that John was not a Sleeper. Anyone with any espionage training would know that the water stood an excellent chance of being drugged. He didn’t think it was. He hadn’t ordered any Special Water. But he didn’t trust Mischa not to drug the both of them.

John exhaled and put the water on the table carefully with his cuffed hands.

“So, what do we do?” John asked bluntly, his eyes clear and direct. Like any civilian, he thought that this misunderstanding must be cleared up soon, and he was eager to cooperate enough to bring it about. This would be a story to tell at the pub a month from now, he undoubtedly thought. Poor bastard, Lucas thought. He has no idea.

“I will be very candid with you, Dr. Watson,” Lucas said, letting only a touch of Russian accent come through. The less you started with, the less noticeable it was if you forgot it later. “There are two things we wish to know.”

John listened attentively, though it was clear he was angry.

“First, we would like to know your party’s purpose in Samashki. Secondly, we would like to know who recruited you to Doctors Without Borders.”

John took a deep breath and said for the hundredth time, “We are here to perform surgeries on children who have been injured by landmines. We have obtained permission from every agency that international law recommends and that Russian law requires. We have approved visas and have not over-stayed. Our medical equipment is sent separately and inspected at every border crossing. We are civilians on a humanitarian mission.”

Lucas regarded him with compassion. _No good deed goes unpunished, Dr. Watson,_ he thought. 

“You were in the Armed Forces at one time, I believe,” He commented.

“Yes.” John said shortly.

“You served in Iraq during the war,” he said.

“Afghanistan,” John corrected immediately.

“Your file says Iraq,” Lucas lied in a mild tone, tapping the file.

“Why would I lie,” John rejoined impatiently. 

“Ah, you only lie if you have a reason?” Lucas asked with a smile.

John stared at him.

“Who recruited you to join Doctors Without Borders,” Lucas asked, after a moment.

“No one recruited me; it’s a well-known organization. I decided to join after I came home from Afghanistan.”

“Your file says Iraq,” Lucas said again.

John gave him an exasperated glare. “You need a new file,” he said in a clipped tone.

Lucas nodded almost sadly. The smaller man sat straight and unafraid, his blond hair as neatly combed as he could manage, his eyes unwavering, his jaw set. Yes, here was a little bit of England. He felt something in him unfold, like a dark flower, and it was aimed at John Watson. He wanted to absorb the smaller man, enfold him, swallow him… and even now they were being watched.


	4. Setting the Stage

By the end of the first hour, John felt himself starting to sweat. The interrogator – Lucas -- seemed to feel that he had already caught John in a lie. But really, his army record was not controversial and he had no idea why the fellow kept referring to him having been in Iraq.

“Did anyone speak to you about the possibility of being in Doctors Without Borders while you were still in active service?” Lucas persisted. For an hour they had been going round and round about the exact time and place and reason he had joined DWB, and who had spoken to him about it. And what he did in Iraq. Except he had never been to Iraq.

“Has anyone approached you about information you might be privy to while you are traveling with this organization?”

“Has your organization made any unexpected changes to the schedule you originally committed to following?”

“Are you reporting your movements to anyone who seems very interested in the organization’s contacts?”

“Are you aware that terrorist attacks have been carried out or thwarted within 2 kilometers of the city center in every city your organization leaves, usually within 24 hours?”

That last one stopped John cold. “What?” He asked disbelievingly.

It wasn’t true, actually. But creating paranoia and doubt were the first steps. Lucas gave a shrug. “Is a strange coincidence, yes?”

John sat silent, staring off to his left. To the left meant he was trying to remember. To the right would mean he was trying to create a fiction.

“How long has that been going on?” John asked, looking a bit ill.

Lucas did a quick mental review of John’s file. “It began in April of 2013.”

Now John looked alarmed. This, of course, was when he’d joined the team.

“You can see now, Dr. Watson, why it is so important that we find out who recruited you. I believe that you are a good man who wants to do the right thing. Perhaps someone has convinced you that the right thing is to help them while you are helping wounded children.” He said delicately.

John looked horrified and shook his head firmly. “No.” He said.

Lucas never shifted his relaxed pose in the chair. He watched John like a hawk.

“Even a name would be very helpful in aiding us. These terrorist attacks, they hurt people, John. They hurt even the people you would help.”

John kept shaking his head. “I am not involved in any terrorist attacks. We are civilians on a humanitarian mission, and that is all we are.”

Lucas stared at him for a long time. Finally, he picked up the file and keys and rose to his feet.

“I am sorry you cannot be more forthcoming, John,” he said quietly.

John looked up at him in dismay.

“I think we will need to talk again.” Lucas stated, and then turned to the mirrored glass and made a gesture for the guards to come and remove John. He made sure that he stood calmly by the table, staring at John as he was led away. He didn’t turn his back until he knew that his _porosnok_ couldn’t see him.


	5. Application of Stress

Lucas stood in the conference room and monitored John on the video feed. The doctor had been in what was euphemistically called a “stress position” … albeit a mild one… for five hours. The guards had followed Lucas’s instructions very closely, he was pleased to note.

His instructions had been specific. Do not hurt John Watson. Do not talk to John Watson. Take him to the next interrogation room. Remove his scrubs. Cut them off. Sit him on a wooden chair. Cuff his hands behind him. Be _absolutely certain_ the cuffs do not impede circulation. Put a black hood over his head. Do not tie it off at the neck. Do not leave him unattended but do not speak to him. Not in Russian, not in English, not at all. Do not speak to each other where John Watson can hear you.

And Lucas watched on the video feed to make absolutely certain his instructions were followed. 

He was waiting. It was nearly time. He left only long enough to shower and change, and brush his teeth, wanting to be a clean, fresh-smelling breeze in contrast to John’s sweat and misery. 

The point of the original questioning, and the lies and thinly veiled accusations, was to impress upon John that the Russians thought they had a good reason to suspect him of something, and as such, he was in a great deal of trouble. It was also important that he believe that he was suspected of acts dreadful enough to warrant harsh treatment. He must believe his captors were, at some level, decent men who were trying to stop atrocities and cruelties.

This was important for two reasons. First, it made him less angry with them and more eager to defend himself against the charges. This was important because anger was a buffer that fortified one’s resolve and as such, it must be removed. Secondly, it would give him the frightful feeling that his captors might feel justified in subjecting him to torture. And as Lucas knew from personal experience, expectation of torture was torture in and of itself. It placed stress upon the mind.

Lucas watched as the naked man on the video feed began to move restlessly on the chair. Yes, he needed to urinate and didn’t want to piss himself. That was what Lucas was waiting for. It was why he’d given John the water. He picked up the keys and the file, and headed into the interrogation room.

 

* * *

John’s shoulders ached in ways he didn’t know they could ache. His left shoulder, scarred and mottled, was his weakest point, and he twisted slightly to make his right shoulder take more of the burden, to shift his bound wrists to the left and ease the strain. His own breath stank in his face. His arms were nearly numb.

He didn’t know how long he’d been tied to the chair, but he estimated several hours. His stomach was a mass of knots. He was certain now that no one here was particularly concerned about his well-being.

Terrorist attacks in every city they had visited?? His mind went over their itinerary again and again… there was no political or terrorist organization he could think of that would want to mount attacks in such a disparate group of places, but what did he know? Every place they had visited was a site of internal strife, that’s why they needed DWB. The players were different but the results were always the same: injured civilians, often children.

He shifted, feeling the cool air on his naked skin. He had to urinate and he had a terrible feeling they were going to make him do it right there in the chair. He intended to hold out as long as possible.

Had their itinerary changed unexpectedly? Well, yes, it had. Twice. Once in Yemen and once in Syria, but they had been coming in response to a terrorist attack. Had another followed? He tried to remember. There were attacks in many of their locations, yes. That’s why they were there!

God, his shoulders ached. He wondered if the other members of his unit even knew that he was in custody. They might not. He had been separated from his unit in a hotel room booking fiasco and had gone to rent a room in the nearest motel he could. That was when he was taken. His fellow doctors must know he was missing, but--

Suddenly he heard the metal door clang open and he lifted his head alertly under the black hood, waiting as the footsteps approached.

After a moment, the hood was gently removed from his head and he looked up to see Lucas Starkov gazing down at him with the same inscrutable gaze as before. Behind him, the two guards stood stonily at the door, watching.

“Are you ready to be more candid with me, John?” He asked gently, in his deep, delicately accented voice.

John shook his head miserably. “I don’t know what you want,” he said honestly, his eyes red but direct.

Lucas put a warm hand on the strained trapezius of John’s injured shoulder, knowing the heat would feel good. He stood over him, watching his face closely, and gave John a long, tight squeeze. The doctor closed his eyes for a moment.

Then Lucas leaned over him to check that the circulation in his hands was not impeded. It was one of the things Oleg would do that the other interrogators would not, and he remembered his own gratitude for such small kindnesses. 

John felt a wash of sensation as his interrogator touched him with warm, clean hands, and the faint scent of soap and cologne drifted under his nose. It was a relief to his senses, and he envied the other man terribly at that moment. It made him very aware of his own stale, sweaty odors.

“Can you let me use a toilet?” John asked hoarsely.

Lucas straightened and gave him a long look, as if considering. It was important that John know his movements were at the mercy of his own personal interrogator, not the guards. 

“If I free your hands and let you use the toilet, and you make any attempt to overpower me… it will not go well.” He said.

John closed his eyes and nodded.

Lucas stepped behind him, one hand still on the naked, sweating shoulder, and unhooked the manacles that held John’s hands together. Then he helped the doctor to his feet, for he’d been in one position long enough to stiffen up. John walked with a very noticeable limp. Keeping his hand firmly on John’s shoulder, Lucas walked his prisoner over to the corner of the room, where a drain rested in a sunken corner of the floor.

John looked at it in disbelief, and then at Lucas. Lucas’s hand was still on his shoulder.

“Go ahead,” Lucas said mildly, staring down at John with his hooded eyes. Even in the relatively dim light of the concrete interrogation room, John could see they were blue.

John’s face was pinched, “I can’t—“ he began expressively, but Lucas merely moved so that he was behind John, hand still firm on his skin.

John took himself in hand and tried to piss, but he just couldn’t for a moment.

“Could you move a little further away?” he suggested to Lucas pointedly.

Lucas leaned in. “No, but I could move closer,” he said very quietly.

John shut his eyes. “Fuck,” he muttered. 

Behind him, Lucas gave a soft chuckle, then jostled his shoulder gently. “Come on.”

Finally, John managed to unleash his bladder, and burning with embarrassment and misery, pissed into the drain while Lucas squeezed his shoulder encouragingly. 

When he was finished, Lucas secured his wrists together, but in front this time.

“Easier on your shoulder?” He asked considerately.

“Yes,” John admitted shortly, and looked away.

“Good. We will sit down again now.” He guided John back to the wooden chair and sat him down. John rested his hands modestly over his groin and tried not to care about being naked.

Lucas, keeping one hand on his captive at all times, turned to a guard and called in Russian for a chair to brought so he could sit beside John.

“Now. John.” He began when he was comfortably settled. “I hope you have had time to think about whether your itinerary ever changed unexpectedly during your time with this medical organization.”

He moved his hand up to the back of John’s neck and squeezed slightly. He knew exactly how comforting a human touch could be under these circumstances. He also knew that there was an undercurrent of discomfort at the dominance he expressed in touching his naked prisoner so casually.

Lucas had been interrogated enough times over the years to develop a comprehensive, categorized list of all the approaches he’d been subjected to. Some interrogators verbally abused you. Some slapped and beat you about the face. Some sexually molested you. He’d been able to withstand such approaches, although not without difficulty. But he knew for a fact that one would eventually make up any lie to get non-stop pain and misery finally to go away. But a little kindness, that made more of an impact. Particularly in contrast to other discomforts.

His other motive, Lucas had to admit to himself, was actually to touch and comfort John Watson. He didn’t want the doctor breaking down immediately—not that he seemed likely to. But it was hard to tell with some people. That and he liked the look of the smaller man. Liked the compact, fit body, the blond hair, the funny nose… Yes, he liked touching John.

“We had a schedule change in Yemen and in Syria,” John told him.

“Good, good,” Lucas said, massaging his neck slightly. “Why did you not say this before?”

“I didn’t remember,” John said, looking at him.

“Mm.” Lucas managed to give the impression that he thought this was probably a lie, but moving on…

“In Yemen, you were at what hotel? Initially?” He asked.

For the next hour, he led John in verbal circles, creating the impression that much of what he had done was suspicious. Why had they moved hotels? Why was he in the same hotel as his colleagues in some cities but not in others? Booked up? Hadn’t they booked in advance? Was John sure? Who had made the bookings? Did he go out to eat? With his colleagues? Sometimes? Did he ever go alone? What day was it that he went alone? But what day was it? But what day of the week was that? Was he sure?

He kept his hand on John at all times, occasionally moving it to a different aching location and pressing, not painfully, just digging in as a masseuse would do. He kept his touch dominant but non-sexual. Slowly, John’s exhaustion began to tell on him and he snapped answers when the questions began to repeat themselves. At one point he brought his manacled hands up and rubbed his face, no longer concerned with hiding his genitals. “I told you this,” he said raggedly.

Lucas rubbed the tired man’s neck, “Yes, but John, you said it was a Wednesday. Now you say it was the 2nd, and that was a Tuesday, and we took down a terror cell that Tuesday evening whose members spent a great deal of time in that restaurant you say you so casually elected to go to alone.”

He kept his tone moderate and reasonable as he made up the incriminating story. Even apologetic. _You see,_ said his tone. _You see why we have to do this? You see why we are interested in you?_

John stared at him, his tired gray-blue eyes searching Lucas’s face. The hawklike visage never softened or wavered, but never showed anger or impatience either. He seemed impervious to emotion, a striking stranger with a deep voice and elegant bearing who simply wanted to know whatever he could learn to prevent the terrorist activities in his country.

The questions went on.

When John was so tired he was indeed giving conflicting answers, Lucas was satisfied. The conflicting answers could be used later to make him seem even more suspicious. For now, it was time to return him to his cell and let him be alone for a few days. Lucas would have to do some preparation before he applied any actual procedures. He needed to know exactly what schedule the other interrogators were on, and needed to create an impression that he was very much in sync with them. But at the same time, he needed not to break John Watson too quickly. It was going to be a fine line.


	6. Employment Opportunities

“So.” Mischa said. They were in the conference room and the flat screen showed that three of the four men were in their cells. The fourth was being waterboarded by the thin, intense Anton. Lucas had stood in the interrogation room and watched, keeping his face as impassive as possible. His nose burned and his head and chest ached with remembered sensation, and more than once he had to stop himself from intervening. 

When the victim began choking on his own vomit, Lucas left, sweating.

Now he was in the conference room, trying to decide what to tell Mischa. If he convinced his handler that Watson was not a Sleeper, there was the danger that the officials would rather make him disappear than let him go to tell his story of Russian captivity to the press. If he produced enough (false) information to convince Mischa that John was indeed a person of interest, there was a danger that they would hand him over to one of the professionals for more intense interrogation. John could not become too valuable of an asset to waste on testing Lucas.

The trick was to make him sound like someone who had been contacted and seemed as if he was being groomed without being willing to acknowledge it. Someone whose conscience was just unclean enough that he wouldn’t go to the press and become an embarrassment to the Russian government. But not someone in so deep that he was too valuable an asset to release.

This was the way to go, Lucas decided. Ideally, John Watson should either seem like someone they wanted to let go so that they could watch him and follow him, or like someone who had begun preliminary experiments in espionage for the fun of it, and could be turned by anyone skillful enough to create a bond with him. He should seem ambitious without seeming too patriotic. He should seem intelligent in handling details but not the type to see the big picture. His army background was a bit of a sticking point. It suggested patriotism. But the medical training suggested ambition and intelligence.

The most ideal situation of all, of course, was that John Watson seem as though he’d been contacted and groomed, and that Lucas would be the one who could turn him and become his handler. Then they could both be sent back to England, John as the heroic doctor rescued/escaped/released from Russia, and Lucas with a new identity to be his handler in the shadows.

 

“So,” Mischa said. This was how he always began.

“I think he was contacted in Yemen, and I think it was Americans.” Lucas said.

Mischa raised his eyebrows appreciatively. 

“So John Watson is working for the Am-er-icans,” he mused.

“Well, I said Americans, I didn’t say THE Americans,” Lucas clarified. Mischa nodded, appreciating the difference. “I don’t think he knows it, though.” Lucas elaborated. “The restaurant where he spent the most time is a known hot-spot for English speaking ex-patriots in general. British, American, Canadian, Aussie… but the way he was contacted… I’m just going by what I know of the American style. Well… what it was eight years ago. I might be outdated,” he added easily, leaning back in his chair.

It was important that he not be held too accountable for the reliability of his report, because he was making the shit up as he went along. Was the restaurant a “known hot-spot?” Well, John Watson and his English-speaking colleagues had gone there a few times, so … probably?

The trick was simply saying it was so, and then moving on as if you had no doubt you’d be believed.

“I think he knows he’s done a few things that weren’t part of the DWB protocol, but he doesn’t quite know what his place is in the scheme of it all,” Lucas lied easily.

“Hm,” Mischa rumbled. “Motive?”

Lucas shrugged. “Could be money, but there’s no trail in his file.”

Mischa nodded.

“I get the impression his contact was the same person each time, so –“

“So there is trust there,” Mischa pronounced. 

“He’s basically honest,” Lucas ventured, “and honest people tend to be trusting.”

Mischa nodded again. “See if you can i-dent-ify his contact.” He said finally. 

“Do I have a deadline?” Lucas asked, leaning forward to stare at Mischa.

“Why do you ask, Lucas?”

“Hey, this is my first job. I don’t want to bollix it up.”

Mischa looked over at the flat screen and then down at his phone, which was silently flashing. He picked it up, spoke briefly in Russian, listened, spoke once more and disconnected.

“If you decide to take Anton’s approach, be more careful. I have nothing against it, but we just lost one of our assets.”

Lucas sat back again, feeling sick. He swallowed and then decided to seize the moment. “Okay, look, I don’t want that fucker messing with my _porosnok._ He’s no handler, he’s only good for one thing and he’ll ruin everything I could accomplish.”

Mischa nodded placatingly. “O-kay, yes, I understand. But you know, Anton did get a great deal of in-formation before…” he made an expressive gesture.

“Before the asset choked to death on his own vomit and now we’ll never get anything out of him again.” Lucas spelled it out.

Mischa gave another of his shrugs. “Yes. What you say is true.”

“Anton’s a shotgun and John Watson’s a fly. There’s no point.” Lucas insisted.

Mischa looked at him. “O-kay. O-kay, no Anton for John Watson, okay? But find out his contact.”

Lucas inhaled deeply. “Can I have commissary privileges?” He said, as though he were bargaining. It would be expected, and it wouldn’t do to let anyone know he was feeling protective of John Watson as John Watson. It could only be as an asset, as his _porosnok._ His little piglet. His job opportunity.

Mischa gave him an indulgent smirk. “I will see to it.”

“And I need a watch. Nice one. A Rolex. Noticeable. I don’t expect to keep it,” he added wryly, and Mischa looked amused.

“Nonsense, you de-serve a watch. We approve of capitalist success now, remember, Lucas?”


	7. The Fine Art of Waterboarding

John was back in his cell, wearing another set of flimsy, pale green scrubs. They were at least clean, although if his experiences so far were anything to go by, he’d be left wearing them for days and soon enough, they’d stink again. But for now, they were clean, and he washed himself with water from the sink as best he could. He was feeling rather weak and shaky. The poor diet was beginning to affect him, as was the constant florescent light. The window let him know night from day, but the light was always on.

He sank onto the cot, face in his hands. Thanks to the focus of Lucas’s questioning, John’s mind was now utterly fixated on their time in Yemen. It was over a year ago and he couldn’t remember it well. They were there for nearly six weeks. They’d performed several surgeries on children brought in from Iraq, wounded by ISIS or by the friendly fire of the Iraqi Police Force. 

Yes, they had switched hotels. Yes, there was a restaurant John had liked. Yes, there were English-speaking businessmen who ate there as well. Yes, he’d had conversations with several of them. Yes, several of them were interested in his work, or polite enough to pretend interest for the purpose of a pleasant conversation. 

But no, no, no, none of them seemed to solicit anything from him that would suggest a link to a terrorist cell targeting a hotel hosting a function for the Russian Embassy. John could only be glad that, as Lucas had told him, that cell’s plans had been prevented by the Russian Secret Police, working a joint operation with MI-6 and the French. But it was very close, John, very close, Lucas told him in his quiet, even voice.

Lucas, for his part, was signing up to use Room 3 on Friday. Today was Tuesday. His stomach was uneasy and his hands were like ice, but no one looking at his face would know it. If there was one thing Lucas was certain of, it was that nothing was better than careful research and preparation, and he intended to do both very extensively.

First, he checked both rooms that were equipped with the tiltboard and the straps, and the sink and buckets and pitchers for the water. They were just garden pitchers, he mused, holding one up. You could buy them at any home improvement store. Again the phrase went through his mind, the banality of evil. 

Lucas put the pitcher aside and then he straddled the boards and looked directly up at the cameras. Were they both set at the same exact angle? He couldn’t be sure.

Lucas spoke to the agent working in the cubicle just outside the conference room, and was directed to the cubicle of the agent who kept archives of recorded sessions. From him, Lucas obtained footage from Rooms 3 and 4. Research, he said (honestly enough) and he was gifted—temporarily—with a laptop and a USB port. Of course, the laptop did not have internet connection. It had very specialized uses. 

He retreated with it to the conference room, rejoicing that he had keys to unlock it with. Mischa was right. It’s the little things, he thought. He settled into a chair and began watching several hours of Anton, Sergei, and Oleg waterboarding _porosnoki._ They used both rooms, and it didn’t take long to ascertain that the angle of the camera was essentially the same, which meant that when an interrogator leaned directly over their subject from the subject’s right (with their back to the door) they blocked the camera’s view of the subject’s face. This was useful information for Lucas.

He continued to watch the footage, noting the different styles of the interrogators. Sergei stood over the subject and held the pitcher high, letting the water hit the captive’s face from a greater height, with greater force. He splashed the water all over the place. It was always a mess when Sergei was done. He wore knee-high rubber boots and approached the session with undisguised enjoyment. Anton and Oleg were both more precise, hovered closer, applied the water very directly. But Oleg gave more recovery time, which was probably why his subjects tended to survive the experience.

If you were given to Anton, the Russians had already decided they probably had little use left for you and were willing to risk losing you entirely.

To his shock, Lucas realized that his own questioning was among the files, and he steadied his hands and breathed through his mouth while he watched himself struggle and gasp and beg. Yes, he remembered how Oleg would place his hand on Lucas’s sweating forehead to help hold his face still. Not brutally, but firmly.

He couldn’t see the exact placement of Oleg’s hand from the camera once Oleg leaned over him. But he could remember. 

Lucas paused the recording for a moment and got up and walked around the table for a moment, trying to focus. It was difficult. He could smell the water. His sinuses burned.

Finally he turned and checked all the footage for time lengths. He had to make sure that he and John were in Room 3 for a strictly average length of time. He was amazed to see that 45 minutes seemed to be about the norm. His own experience had seemed like hours and hours… but that was the point, wasn’t it?

Finally, Lucas made careful note of Oleg’s ration of water to respite, nodding to himself. Yes, his was the model. 

When he was finished, Lucas returned the USB and the laptop to the agent, logged out of the conference area, and went downstairs to the guards outside John Watson’s door. Beckoning one far enough away that John would not hear his voice, he gave his directives. No food for the next three days, unless Lucas brought it himself. Then he went to the back of the level where the offices were to the cafeteria.

 

When he heard the activity outside his door, John stood alertly. He wasn’t sure now if he anticipated or dreaded whatever was coming. All he knew was that he had gone another three days with no human contact, and anything was a development. The door opened and Lucas Starkov entered, carrying a plate of hot food. It smelled delicious. He was dressed in black again. He seemed taller and thinner than ever in the shabby, bright white cell. He looked clean-shaven and well-groomed, in contrast to his captive.

“Sit, sit,” Lucas said genially, and took the metal chair after John had sunk back to the cot. He put the plate of food on John’s lap, with a plastic fork.

“Thank you,” John said uncertainly. His hands were shaking, he wanted the food so much.

“Is a reward,” Lucas told him, with that slight smile of his. “Your information concerning your movements in Yemen have helped us direct our inquiry in a much more focused and organized manner. Eat, please.”

Lucas sat quietly and watched John down the food. He’d chosen it very carefully: it was almost entirely protein. Eggs, cheese, meat… even the vegetables were non-starch. Cauliflower, peppers, real butter, plenty of salt. He would get this meal, and one more tomorrow, and they would be his last meals until after the waterboarding. Lucas intended that John’s stomach be completely empty. If he was able to carry out the procedure the way he intended, there would be no danger. But he wasn’t going to risk John choking on his own vomit.

At the same time, he wanted John healthy enough not to have blood sugar or heartbeat irregularity issues, hence the protein. He looked at the smaller man quickly but neatly putting the food into his mouth, eyes downcast. John could have no way of knowing how carefully Lucas was looking out for him. Someday he might know. But for now, he couldn’t be aware that his interrogator was actually risking himself to ensure his subject’s safety. Because you are mine, thought Lucas. 

When John had finished, he set the plate aside, on his cot. “God, that was good,” he commented, glancing around, his eyes avoiding Lucas. Yes, gratitude is uncomfortable in this situation, Lucas knew. He checked the time, making sure John saw the Rolex. It was a silver and blue Submariner, very nice. He’d been impressed by Mischa’s choice, having expected something gaudy and gold. Actually, he was rather touched, and warned himself about it.

“John,” Lucas said evenly, his hands on lean, his black-clad thighs. “We will need to talk again soon and I should let you know now, so that you can try to remember. I need the names of the businessmen you spoke with at those lunches in that restaurant in Yemen.”

“It was over a year ago,” John protested, alarmed. It was good, though, to see all anger had gone. There was only concern and trepidation on his honest face now.

“Yes, I understand. But there were those with whom you spoke more than once. Perhaps you spoke of your professions. Try to remember whatever you can. A name. A city in America—“

Lucas broke off, trying to look as though he hadn’t meant to say that.

John seized on it, of course. “America,” he repeated, his eyes wandering down, clearly mentally searching his memories.

“Any particular type of business, any references to areas of regular travel, or reminiscing about foreign vacations. If any of them gave you a business card. If they mentioned previous military experience, like yours. Things you talked about together. Things you had in common.” Lucas suggested.

John sat silent, obviously concentrating.

“I must tell you,” Lucas said seriously, “there is chatter about possible activity in the near future in Vladikavkaz.”

John looked up at him, puzzling.

“It is near Beslan. You remember what they did in Beslan, John,” Lucas said, looking at him intently. “You can help us a great deal if you can remember the names of some of the men you dined with in Yemen. It is of utmost importance to us.”

Then he stood and took the empty plate. “I hope you will be willing to help us, John,” he said somberly, and exited the cell.


	8. Creating Memories

After Lucas had left, John lay on the cot, reviewing everything he could think of from his time in Yemen. Knowing how one memory could lead to another, he began thinking about Mary Morstan. Because it was when he was in Yemen that she’d broken up with him. Over Skype, of all things. She’d cried, and he’d nearly, but it was inevitable. It wasn’t even about the distance.

It was about his inability to settle down, his need for more adventure, more challenge—

John paused. Was there something he wasn’t admitting to himself? He closed his eyes and remembered the evening Mary had broken up with him. He’d argued with her, of course, as if you could argue someone into staying with you. Then she’d started crying and he’d felt like a bully, making her cry. He told her he loved her and he understood, although he didn’t understand, and then he closed the laptop and went down to the hotel bar for a drink.

And he’d ended up making friends with an American businessman. Well, I say friend, he thought. More of a fellow traveler. Oh, no, wait, that’s what Communists used to say, John smiled to himself. He was just a guy. Just a businessman from… from… where was he from?

Because that fellow DID start the conversation. And they DID end up talking for quite a while, about women and life and jobs that required travel, and the hell they made on your lovelife. And that fellow and he DID end up meeting at the restaurant for lunch a few times. Nothing big, just… in a foreign country, it’s nice to meet someone you can talk to who isn’t a co-worker.

John concentrated hard, trying to put himself back in that restaurant. Blue walls, lots of really gorgeous tile and mosaics… very Islamic décor. Not modern or upscale, quite traditional, but popular with Brits and Americans.

And he and that fellow had met up a couple times. The fellow was from… Philadelphia. Yes. City of Brotherly Love, he’d said that. Then he told John about the racial unrest and the self-segregating, and … he’d worked in personnel recruitment for overseas construction. Upper management. “Haliburton,” John had joked and the fellow had laughed and shrugged and said, “Yeah, they hire too.”

They had talked about the embassy functions they’d been to. Doctors Without Borders attended quite a few. Always looking for donations, connections, photo opportunities. They had to raise funds on their own. There had been some schmoozing involved.

Had there been an attack on the Russian embassy in Yemen not long after they left? John couldn’t remember. He wished he had his phone to look it up, but of course everything he owned was in a baggie behind a counter somewhere in this sprawling building.

He got up and paced restlessly in his small cell.

The other issue Lucas had gotten him thinking about was his initial decision to join DWB. He’d said no one had spoken to him about it, but that wasn’t entirely true. Mike Stamford had spoken to him about it. At length.

“It’s just the thing for you,” Mike had told him cheerfully that day in the park. “You wouldn’t want to be doing life-saving surgery with that hand tremor, but you can do cosmetic surgery. Think about some poor little girl with half her face ripped away by shrapnel—“

John had winced.

“—you’re good enough to help her. And they’ll take you. I have a friend who’s involved, I’ll shoot him an email.”

Yes, Mike Stamford—no way was John giving that name to the Russians. Plump, jolly Mike had nothing to do with anything, John was certain. But it did give him a guilty plunge in his gut when Lucas put that hawkish face close to his own and searched his eyes.

“John, who recruited you? I think you are not telling me something. I think there is a name you want to give me.”

John lay back down and pictured Lucas’s face. Hawk wasn’t an entirely fair description. Yes, that nose was practically a weapon. Yes, his thin lips and lean cheeks utterly lacked any softness. But despite the lines that curved down from the nose toward the mouth, it wasn’t a cruel face. The lips weren’t pressed or flat. And his eyes were disconcerting. Very large. Deep-set, direct, intense… you couldn’t read anything in them except for the fact that they were watching you, John thought. Blue. Blue like the walls of that restaurant. 

His visage over all was… a little stern, but not threateningly so. Focused. Very focused. High set ears… John remembered reading somewhere that this was a sign of intelligence. Well, if that was true, Lucas must be in genius territory, because his ears sat up on his head like Spock. Very thick hair.

John drifted off to sleep.

* * *

 

Lucas was in the conference room reading up on the psychology of torture. It was one of the e-books on the laptop the research and archives agent let him borrow. 

_The torture victim's own body is rendered his worse enemy. It is corporeal agony that compels the sufferer to mutate, his identity to fragment, his ideals and principles to crumble. The body becomes an accomplice of the tormentor, an uninterruptible channel of communication, a treasonous, poisoned territory._

Lucas silently agreed. His own body had ceased to be his some time ago. It still seemed foreign sometimes, an entity apart. And he had bad dreams—he shook his head and kept reading. Worry about that later. 

He glanced up at the flat screen, as he did every few moments. John was pacing.

Lucas returned his attention to the e-book. His brows drew together as he read.

_It fosters a humiliating dependency of the abused on the perpetrator. Bodily needs denied – sleep, toilet, food, water – are wrongly perceived by the victim as the direct causes of his degradation and dehumanization. As he sees it, he is rendered bestial not by the sadistic bullies around him but by his own flesh._

Humiliating dependency. Yes. That was what he needed to foster in John Watson. A betrayal of his own body. Your body is weak, but your interrogator is strong. Lucas remembered it all too perfectly, the day he’d stood on a chair with his sheet fastened into a noose, and Oleg—

Lucas shook his head violently, like a bear tormented by bees. Fucking Oleg. His arms wrapped around your hips, surprising emotion on his face…

He hated Oleg.

No he didn’t.

John had stopped pacing and lay on his back on the cot now, staring up at the ceiling.

Lucas sighed and kept perusing the book. _Torture splinters early childhood grandiose narcissistic fantasies of uniqueness, omnipotence, invulnerability, and impenetrability. But it enhances the fantasy of merger with an idealized and omnipotent (though not benign) other – the inflicter of agony. The twin processes of individuation and separation are reversed._

Idealized and omnipotent. That was the image he must let John Watson develop of him. Hence the perfect grooming, the implacable demeanor, the relaxed, in control image. For once, Lucas was grateful for his physical presence. To be tall and lean, to have vivid coloring and strong features, and a deep voice… it was a torturer’s gift.

When it was time to begin their first session, John must not see any uncertainty. Lucas realized, suddenly, that he needed a physical rehearsal of the waterboarding. He didn’t need to waterboard anyone else, but he wanted to go into the empty room, fill the pitcher with water, pull up the stool and sit on it, stare down at the board as if John were strapped to it, and place his hand so. And lift that tacky green plastic home improvement fucking made-in-China water pitcher, and pour the water just as it needed to be poured. The stool had to be placed perfectly, and he couldn’t afford to hesitate, scooting it this way and that. It must look as though Lucas had done this many times, to many men. And calmly, implacably.

Lucas checked on John one more time, and then went to Room 3. It was empty, and he walked about it, checking the ceiling again, filling the pitcher, setting it down by the tilt-board. Placing the stool and sitting on it --- see, he’d put the pitcher on the wrong side. He’d have to reach for it, leaning over gracelessly, passing it from one hand to the other. That wouldn’t do. At some level it would be obvious that he had never done this before. It must look automatic.

He stood up and rehearsed his movements again, placing the stool just so. Placing the pitcher just so. Placing his hands just so. 

Then he emptied the pitcher, put the stool back, and did it again.

And then one more time.

Finally, satisfied, he stood, put the implements back and picked up one of the rags that was usually pressed over the subject’s face. He brought it to his nose and sniffed it. Jesus, that was disgusting. He’d bring his own towel, he decided, and went back to the conference room.

On the flat screen, John was asleep. The two other MI-6 agents who were still alive were featured as well, but Lucas avoided looking at them. One had a swollen face and was curled on his bed, not moving much. Fucking Sergei had beat the shit out of him. The other was behaving much like John. He must be Oleg’s. Of course, the fourth room was empty now. That quarter of the screen was black.

 _Poor bastard,_ Lucas thought. _Better off dead._

He returned to reading his e-book, his eyes tired. _The victim tries to "control" his tormentor by becoming one with him (introjecting him) and by appealing to the monster's presumably dormant humanity and empathy._

Yes. You let John Watson get to you, just a bit. Let him see himself getting to you.

_This bonding is especially strong when the torturer and the tortured form a dyad and "collaborate" in the rituals and acts of torture. For instance, when the victim is coerced into selecting the torture implements and the types of torment to be inflicted, or to choose between two evils._

Now that was interesting. Lucas sat back and rubbed his eyes. Tomorrow John gets one more good meal, and one more chance to give me some names. Any names. The names don’t even matter. What matters is, him looking me in the eye and giving me other people’s names.

He remembered this step well. Once you’ve betrayed others, you have chosen your tormenter over them. That’s the beginning of that dyad. However, given Lucas’s position as a possible Turn, he didn’t actually want John to give him any names tomorrow.

Tomorrow was too soon. Lucas didn’t want the names until John was strapped on that tilt-board, gasping and begging, and all of it on camera. Because just as their bond began when John gave Lucas the names, Mischa would believe that his bond with Lucas became official when Lucas tortured a fellow countryman in order to get those names for Mother Russia. 

Lucas glanced back at the laptop and one more paragraph caught his eye. 

_Torture is the ultimate act of perverted intimacy. The torturer invades the victim's body, pervades his psyche, and possesses his mind. Deprived of contact with others and starved for human interactions, the prey bonds with the predator._

He gave a dark smile. He would be free of Oleg when John Watson was his. When he’d become the predator, he would no longer remember what it was like to be prey. Lucas was counting on this.

Now he closed the laptop, took it to the desk, left it there (the agent was gone for the night) and left. He locked the conference room behind him, pleased to be trusted. Then he went to his rooms, which were simple, and furnished like a minimalist, bland motel. But it was progress. He had moved up the prison hierarchy. He was a kapo now, he thought morbidly.

Well, so be it. Because Lucas had a plan.

He pulled his clothes off and stood for a moment in front of the bathroom mirror, rubbing his hand over the prison tattoos on his chest and arms. Mustn’t let John Watson see those any time soon. He brooded for a bit, and then shut off the light and went to bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quotes are from _The Psychology of Torture_ by Dr. Sam Vakni


	9. Breakfast

In accordance with his plans, on Thursday morning, Lucas showered, shaved carefully, and applied a touch of the cologne Mischa had obtained for him. It was really very nice. He needed to re-evaluate his assessment of Mischa’s tastes in general. 

Lucas paused, realizing that Mischa’s entire heavy, Boris-like persona was likely as fake as his name. As fake as Lucas’ own delicate, deliberate accent when talking to John Watson. Something to remember, he noted, and dressed himself neatly. Remember, yes. 

But now it is time to get John a very nice, very heavy, protein-rich breakfast. Something to keep him going until tomorrow morning’s session in Room 3, which would happen no matter what John Watson said or did today. But he would not know that.

Lucas fed himself well, and then selected John’s breakfast. He intended it to be very much like an offering, a bribe, a reward, a gift… something that would show how very anxious Lucas Starkov was to get the names that would help him prevent the supposed up-coming terrorist attack in… what town had he said? Shit…

Near Beslan… Vladikavkaz! Yes. Fine.

Lucas loaded the plate with eggs, steak, bacon, and green bell peppers. No fruit. No pancakes. He included a fresh coffee with heavy cream and no sugar. Yes, this would be good. It would hold John well in terms of health, and not give him any ups and downs of the blood sugar. But by the following morning, his stomach would be empty again, and he would be hungry and anxious… anxious that his benefactor was angry with him. Angry because he had not remembered names. And that was when Lucas wanted him to remember the names.

 

When Lucas entered the cell with the steaming, loaded plate, he gave John a bit more of a smile than usual. John stood, receiving the hot plate with both hands. The guards had not brought him supper, although to be honest, he felt that he could survive the night well enough. He hadn’t dared hope for such a breakfast, though.

And coffee! He set the plate down and gave an appreciative slurp. “Oh, God, this is what I needed,” he breathed.

Lucas gave him a half-smile and pulled up the metal chair. “Yes, we keep the good stuff to ourselves, generally.”

John sat down and scarfed down the food. The bacon in particular delighted him. Lucas watched closely.

When John had finished, heaving a contented sigh, he set the empty plate on the cot at his side.

“Now,” Lucas said, leaning forward, elbows resting on his knees, and his dark hair falling forward toward his eyes. “John. I need you to tell me what you can remember about the businessmen you met with in Yemen, and anyone who helped you decide to join Doctors Without Borders.”

John took a deep breath. “I… have I been charged with anything at this point?”

Lucas stared at him inscrutably. “No. You are not even officially here.”

John swallowed. “Will I ever get a lawyer?”

Lucas smiled, remembering Oleg’s response to that question. Now it was his turn to say deliberately, “Think of me as your lawyer,” and then to watch the face across from him register that.

John retreated mentally for a moment. Lucas allowed it, because again… he did not want to make progress too quickly.

Finally, John said shortly, “I do remember one fellow.”

Lucas nodded, and waited. John said, “He was from Philadelphia. He, um… he worked for a civilian contractor who had government defense contracts, like Haliburton. He was a headhunter, basically. Recruiting upper level management… needed internationally educated, bilingual types, I remember. English and Arabic, or English and French would work for the Maghreb area, he said…”

Lucas waited.

“He did talk a lot about embassy functions. He knew more about them than I’d have expected,” John added. There was a silence. “I mean, mostly the American Embassy, but he mentioned the others.”

Lucas continued to look at John. 

“Um… he… I don’t remember him asking me a lot about DWB, but he did ask a lot about the people I knew at the embassies. He was more interested in the fund-raising side of our itinerary. Dinners, meet and greets, that sort of thing.”

“Schedules,” Lucas prompted.

“Kind of—well—I mean, we talked about dates. The date of this or that event,” John said.

Lucas nodded. “And do you remember his name?” (Please say no).

John shook his head regretfully. “I don’t. But how many headhunters can there be from Philly hanging out in Yemen?”

Lucas heaved a deep sigh and gave John a dissatisfied stare.

“And have you thought more about who initially helped you decide to join this … charitable medical organization?” He injected some irony into his tone.

John gave him a chary look. “If I had, and if I said… what would happen to them?”

Lucas straightened alertly. Oh, he WAS withholding a name! He did remember a name. This was excellent. Now Lucas had a very distinct goal for tomorrow’s session in Room Three. The name of the American businessman, and the name of the friend who had first mentioned Doctors Without Borders.

“John, nothing would happen to them,” he protested, in what he hoped was a tone of offended sincerity. “We do not go into other people’s countries and invade their office buildings and… and snatch them out of the elevator on their way to the vending machine!”

John gave a reluctant laugh. Lucas’s eyes shone with triumph. _Yes. I have you._

“We simply begin looking at their contacts, try to see if they have been in touch with someone whose activities have already put them on an alert list.”

“And if they have?” John asked guardedly.

“Then we may pick up the contact. If they are in this country, or in a country where their intelligence agency is working with us. And currently, there are many of us working together. This potential item in Vladikavkaz is very worrisome. We are working with your very own government, and the French.”

“But the Americans?” John asked curiously.

Lucas gave an irritated snort and looked away. “They always want to do things on their own,” he said. Then he turned back. “I need the names, John.” He said implacably.

John sat silently for a moment. “I can’t remember,” he said finally, and now there was a hint of stubbornness in his reply.

Lucas’s heart fairly soared with satisfaction. But he schooled his features into a stern, forbidding stare and rose to his feet. “I am sorry to hear you say that John. I have been encouraged to question you in a manner that will convey our urgency, but I have been hesitant as long as I felt that you were honest with me. But now… now I can see that you are determined to do this the more difficult way.”

With that little speech, and a resentful look, Lucas stalked out, leaving John staring uneasily at his empty plate.

Once outside the cell, Lucas went hunting about all the areas of the facility that he was authorized to enter. It was a limited area; he was still on probation, as it were. But he searched until he found a wheelchair, up in medical. He had to dust it off, but he rolled it down to his room and sat in it broodingly that evening. To his surprise, he was beginning to anticipate his session tomorrow with John, in Room Three. And all the rituals and acts they would create together.


	10. Rituals

_…This bonding is especially strong when the torturer and the tortured form a dyad and "collaborate" in the rituals and acts of torture…_

John did not sleep well that night. The bright florescent light shone down, and he turned on the bare cot, continuously aware of its stale, mildew smell. He wracked his brain for the American businessman’s name, and finally, at what must have been three in the morning, it came to him: Steve Franklin. Lucas was right, the man had given him a card… Holy Fuck, it was still in his wallet!

Jesus, all they had to do was check his possessions… hadn’t they? John pondered that. Perhaps they had. Surely they had. Surely they had! This was a test.

They already knew the name.

John sat up in bed. They knew the name; they had to. So the question was, what was the nature of this test? Did he want to pass it, or fail it? Did he want to show that he was honest, or did he want to show that he could not be intimidated? John wasn’t sure which response would get him what he wanted. 

What he wanted was to be free, but increasingly, this seemed unlikely. John lay back in his bed and scrubbed at his face with his hands. What had Lucas meant by questioning him “in a manner that will convey our urgency?”

Should he give at least Steve Franklin’s name? Let them sort through the fellow’s contacts? If it would prevent a terrorist attack? His own government involved… God, why didn’t they just give him back to his own government? To hell with DWB, John was ready at this point to go home, rent a little studio in Wales, and live on his pension.

It took a very long time for the sky to lighten. But then it did. John splashed water on his face and began pacing. Would there be breakfast? They’d given him nothing after Lucas had left with his barely controlled anger. John was hungry. Not shaky, surprisingly enough… but hungry. His stomach contracted and growled.

And then John heard the activity coming down his hall. Instinctively he knew that this was not breakfast.

Lucas was coming to question him in a manner that would convey their urgency.

He stood.

The door opened, and the guards entered, and then Lucas was there, tall and pale, face focused and strict. Wearing dark clothes, as usual. He pushed a wheelchair before him and gave John a nod as if to indicate that he should sit.

John backed up against the sink.

“Unless you’d like to give me the names now,” Lucas said in his deep, deliberate, slightly staccato voice. They stared at one another.

“Why—“ John gestured at the chair. It was amazing how terrifying a wheelchair could suddenly become.

“I would not want you to hurt or strain yourself in some ill-advised escape attempt,” Lucas told him.

They stared at each other for another moment. John’s face had gone white.

Lucas turned to the guards and spoke to them in Russian. They backed out of the room and waited in the passageway. Lucas turned back to John.

“John, this chair is not going to hurt you. Nothing will happen to you while you are in this chair. Come and sit down.”

John remained up against the sink, staring at the wheelchair.

Lucas came forward and put his hands gently on John’s upper arms. “Come,” he said, and drew John forward. “I want you to sit.”

John sank into the chair, his stomach sour with dread. Lucas sat down on the cot, facing him. “Let me tell you what is going to happen, John. I am going to strap your wrists and ankles into this chair. I am going to strap you across the chest and waist. I am going to wheel you down the hall and into an elevator. We will go down two floors. When we leave the elevator, we will proceed down a hallway to Interrogation Room number three. When we reach that room, I will unstrap you and help you from this chair. Do you understand?”

John stared straight before him, listening. He felt as though he were going into shock. Coldness swept over him. Suddenly, he felt a warm hand on his arm.

“John, you are in control of this. You have two names in your mouth, I know you do. You have them now. You can stop this at any time.” Lucas said softly.

John didn’t respond.

Lucas’s eyes took on a bright gleam, though his captive was too lost in his own haze of dread to notice.

“John, give me your wrist so that I can strap it down.”

Dazed, John moved his hand into Lucas’s warm grasp. Lucas took it, feeling a thrill go through his entire body. This was what it felt like to have John Watson under his control. He strapped the right wrist snugly to the chair.

“Other hand, John.” He said, and John complied, still staring straight ahead.

Then Lucas knelt and carefully strapped John’s ankles to the footrests of the chair. Then he leaned in close, letting John inhale his cologne, and his clean scent, and drew a strap across the smaller man’s chest and another low on his waist, and cinched them tight.

When he was finished, Lucas stepped behind the chair, aware that he felt more alive than he’d felt in years. He put one hand on John’s shoulder, near his neck.

“Good, John. That was very good.” Then he wheeled his captive out of the cell and they proceeded to Room Three.


	11. Room Three

The trip down the hallway lived in John’s dreams for some time. The entire experience was surreal. Lucas pushed the wheelchair, one warm hand on John’s shoulder the entire time, and they moved slowly under the florescent lights to the elevator.

The 20 seconds in the elevator seemed to tick like a giant bomb in John’s head. Lucas did not say a word. The guards took the stairs, leaving the two men alone in the elevator. Then the doors slid open and John was wheeled down the hall and into Room Three.

The guards followed them in. When the four were in, John stared down at the tilt-board, and the straps, and the deep sink, and the buckets, and the pitchers, and the rubber boots sitting in the corner. He was terrified, and yet… it was as though he’d gone into a trance. The air around him was thick and slow. 

Lucas came around and leaned over him, his deep eyes searching John’s dilated ones.

“John. I will tell you what is going to happen every step of the way. Right now, I am going to unstrap you and then I am going to step out of the room. The guards will position you on the tilt-board and apply the restraints. The guards are not going to question you or apply any procedures to you. Only I will do that. I am going to wait outside until you are ready. Do you understand me? John?”

John stared back at him numbly. Lucas brought his hand to John’s face. “Can you hear me?” he asked with mild concern.

John nodded.

Lucas straightened. “Good. I will wait outside.”

He turned and gave orders in Russian to the guards, making it very clear that John Watson was not to be hurt. Then he went and waited outside the door, his heart thrumming with excitement. 

As he stood, face blank but eyes wild, another door opened down the hall and Sergei exited, glanced over, and saw him. Lucas regarded him with burning eyes, willing him not to even try to enter this room. Hairy fucker.

Sergei came to him with a huge grin, and spoke in his coarse Russian, “Look who’s on top now, eh? Gonna be the one with the big hands now, eh?”

Lucas glared at him threateningly.

Sergei’s eyes darted to the door behind him. “You want some help? I could show you some shit.”

“Get the fuck out of here,” Lucas answered, also in Russian. “This is mine.”

Sergei’s grin widened. “Always knew you were a natural,” he said approvingly, and sauntered to the stairs. Lucas stared after him till he was gone. Motherfucker. He really hoped one day he could break that bastard’s neck.

Then the guards opened the door to let him know that John Watson was ready.

 

* * *

 

The act of waterboarding is actually not well understood. The essence of it is that water fills the victim’s sinuses and they feel like they are drowning. Of course, depending on where that water goes next, and the skill of the interrogator, and the reaction of the victim, drowning does sometimes occur. Or stroke. Or heart attack. Or brain aneurysm. Any number of things can go wrong, which is why the Don’t Try This At Home sticker comes with each kit.

But as for the simple fact of water in the sinuses, this is not in and of itself torture. There are people out there using Neti-Pot in the morning while they wait for the tea kettle to boil. Divers and Navy Seals become quite accustomed to blowing water and snot out of their sinuses and wiping the mucus on anything nearby, explaining their divorce rate. 

It’s the control issue. It’s having any invasive procedure applied to you by a hostile force that may have little interest in your survival. It’s having it done over and over against your will. It’s having no choice. It’s having your arms and legs secured. It’s not knowing when it will start or how long it will last or if something else will follow. Much of torture is psychological.

But given what can go wrong, Lucas North had no intention of actually waterboarding John Watson. Not in the technical sense. Oh, he’d be strapped down. He’d be terrified. There would be water in his face and lots of it. It would go down his throat if he wasn’t careful. He’d be unable to breathe for 20-30 seconds at a time. It would go on and on. There would be questioning.

However, as Lucas filled the water pitcher and set it down to his right, he put the stool such that his head would block the camera’s view of John’s face. John’s blank, white, terrified face. And using Oleg’s technique of applying a hand to the subject’s face, Lucas could close off John’s nostrils and simply pour the water over his face.

If John panicked and opened his mouth, it would go into his mouth and there was some danger of him inhaling it. But most people instinctively keep water out of their mouth. It’s the nostrils that are vulnerable.

Still, Lucas needed John to react. To thrash and sputter and gasp, and spit water, and cough. He needed it to go on for 45 minutes. He’d counted the very seconds that Oleg had allowed his subjects respite, and he figured that six rounds, several minutes apart, interspersed with questioning and some visually dramatic abuse would create a video-tape equal to the others. And at the end of it, Lucas intended to have two names. 

Two names, they could be any names. But they would represent that John had succumbed to Lucas, and Lucas was well on his way to controlling John. This would be displayed to Mischa as progress.

Lucas sat down at John’s side and let his eyes rove coolly over the bound man. He was still in his scrubs. Lucas had decided not to have him naked. His wrists and legs were secured. His torso was strapped down at the chest and hips. His head was wedged between two smaller blocks of wood. Lucas nodded, satisfied. He placed on hand on John’s chest, feeling the heart thumping wildly beneath it.

John was like a buffet dinner laid out before him. His head was lower than his feet, which is why they called it a tilt-board. This would enable the water to go up the subject’s nose, if the interrogator wished it.

Lucas spoke in Russian over his shoulder and the guards stepped outside to ensure that no one (Sergei!) came in to “help” Lucas. It also ensured that no sharp-eyed guard noticed that he was pinching off the subject’s nostrils. When they were outside, Lucas drew a cloth from his belt loop and spoke.

“John. Let me tell you what is going to happen. I am going to ask you for the name of the man you met in Yemen. If you do not tell me his name, I will make breathing very difficult for you. It is as simple as that. This will continue until I have those names. This is not something I enjoy, but I am willing to do it if it will prevent a terrorist attack on my country. I feel certain you would do the same for your own country. Do you have anything to say?”

John stared up at him with wide eyes but said nothing. He seemed to be almost hypnotized.

Lucas put the towel over his nose and mouth and pinched off John’s nose, holding the pitcher threateningly over his face. John’s eyes widened still more as he clamped his lips shut. Lucas held on for long seconds until John finally opened his mouth with a gasp for air. He gave John a second to gasp and then began pouring the water.

To John, it seemed as though Lucas was deliberately trying to pour water into his open mouth while he was breathing. He couldn’t know that this was not the case, and the effect was close enough. The water poured over his face, in his eyes, in his ears, and it poured long and steadily so that John couldn’t open his mouth for another gasp of air. Lucas held his face firmly and poured, and poured, and poured, and John held on for as long as he could before starting to thrash in a panic. He was afraid to exhale, but he finally did, blowing water everywhere and arching his back wildly.

Lucas sat back, satisfied, removing the sodden cloth. John coughed and sputtered violently, and Lucas counted to ten before replacing the cloth, putting his hand over John’s face again, and pouring more water. He repeated this procedure until John was nearly frantic, and then he put the pitcher down. He put his hand in John’s hair, grabbed a nice handful, and pulled his head back firmly, moving slightly aside so as not to block the camera for this part.

“What is the name of the man you met in Yemen?” He asked calmly. And it was amazing how easily it all came to him, suddenly. He put his hands on John often, on his chest and shoulders and arms and face. On his throat. Nothing sexual. Just dominant, casual, and controlling. 

“What was the name of the restaurant? You’ve told me before? Tell me again. Tell me again the days that you ate there. Tell me again what time of day. What day of the week. Who was there? How long did you sit? Could you see out a window? Tell me again why you were in a different hotel than the others—“ and all the other questions that meant nothing whatsoever, but were meant only to confuse, harass, and exhaust.

He stood to refill the pitcher. “I feel that there is so much more you could tell me, John, if you really wanted to.”

And then the hovering pitcher, the cloth, the pinching nostrils and the waiting until John gasped for air again. Lucas began to push the count of the pouring water. John could hold it for 25 seconds before he began to writhe and thump his hips under the straps that held him.

Lucas let him spit and gasp and cough again. Calmly, he checked his watch.

By the twenty minute mark, John was begging. “Please. Please… wait, just wait—“

Lucas held the pitcher over his face without a trace of mercy on his own visage.

“Name,” he said flatly. “Once I start pouring, I’m not stopping until this pitcher is empty, John. I am just telling you now.”

John took a deep breath and stared at the pitcher. Lucas pushed the cloth over his nose and began pouring very slowly. John’s eyes rolled back in his head as Lucas’s hand pushed down hard on his face, and the water kept coming. The thrashing started again, and Lucas disregarded it, pouring slowly and calmly.

Suddenly John’s mouth opened and he choked on the water, which spewed in all directions. Lucas sat back and watched calmly, feeling oddly detached. 

John coughed up water, gagged, spewed out more and finally, gasping, said, “Steve Franklin! Steve Franklin!”

Lucas’s shoulders relaxed. He petted John’s hair approvingly, and set the pitcher down. “Good, John,” he said soothingly. “Very good.” He took a dry towel from the pocket on the back of the wheelchair and dried John’s face off, and suddenly, he wanted to kiss his tied up victim. John’s soaked hair stood up in spikes, and his throat was working desperately as he swallowed what water he couldn’t spit up. And Lucas wanted to put his face in that throat.

“Good, John. Good, good…” he grasped the other man’s shoulders.

“Nothing is going to happen to Steve Franklin, John. You don’t need to be afraid of that.”

John lay gasping, eyes closed. Lucas looked at his watch. Ten more minutes. He stroked John’s arm comfortingly, waiting until the gasping and coughing had subsided. He checked that John’s hands weren’t cold with shock or constricted circulation. He checked the bare feet.

Then he went and filled the pitcher again. John stared at him in pitiful surprise. When Lucas returned, he smiled down and said, “You are doing very well, John. I think we are nearly finished. There is just one other name that you want to tell me. What is that name?”

John clamped his mouth shut and Lucas nodded. “I know. I know. He’s your friend. You’re worried for him. I understand. But you need to tell me his name.” 

He waited, and was pleased when John refused. He put his hand over John’s face, noting the gulp of air his porosnok took, and then waited till his mouth opened again. A second’s respite, and then he poured the water slowly, watching it cascade over the face and neck of his bound victim. He counted to nearly 40 when John blew out water, and then he kept pouring until John was nearly convulsing.

Finally, at almost exactly the perfect time, John gurgled, “Mike.” Lucas stopped and let him cough it out. “Mike Stamford, Oh God, Mike, I’m sorry. I’m sorry—“ and he seemed to emit a few sobs.

Lucas put the pitcher down and dried John’s face, and squeezed his arms reassuringly. “There now, see? See? And now I stop. I said that I would stop and I have,” he murmured, as John coughed weakly. “I told you from the beginning, you can make me stop at any time. It is really you who are in control.”

He continued his nonsensical murmurs, keeping John tied down till the last possible minute, keeping him there until his breathing returned to normal and he was limp, gazing up at Lucas, exhausted.

“All of this unpleasantness could have been avoided, John,” Lucas said, gazing down at him in satisfaction, his hand on the other man’s cheek.

John gave a raspy scoff. “Unpleasantness,” he breathed.

“Yes, I found it unpleasant,” Lucas said calmly. “Look what you did to my shoes, you stubborn fuck.”

John coughed up a weak laugh. “Tough shit,” he said.

Lucas stared down at him with a smile in his eyes and thought, _I will absolutely have you._


	12. Progress

Lucas helped John back into the wheelchair himself, leaving the guards outside. John gave him his wrists to be tied down without resistance, which fact made something grow warm in Lucas’s lower belly. When John was securely fastened, Lucas towel-dried his hair and smoothed it down with his fingers.

“I think you are no worse for wear,” he said, and turned the wheelchair to exit the room.

When he had John back in his own room, and the guards outside the door, Lucas kept him in the chair for a bit. He sat down on John’s cot, facing him. “You needed to go through that, John.” He told the other man seriously.

John stared at him.

“You did. You could have told me the names, but you could not live with yourself if you had simply given them up. You needed to endure that first. Now you can live with yourself, and yet you also know that you may have helped us prevent something catastrophic.”

John shook his head wearily. “I will never believe Mike Stamford is involved in anything destructive.”

Lucas shrugged easily. “You are probably right. He could be, however, manipulated by someone else entirely. Someone who thinks I need a contact in Yemen, and says to your friend, Say, you know any doctors who need a job?”

John looked at him again, obviously thinking that over.

“Anyway. As I told you, nothing is going to happen to Mike Stamford. He is in England, I suppose, watching football. Brazil vs Mexico this weekend you know.”

John gave a hiss of envy.

Lucas smiled. “I think Brazil.” John gave him a look. “Mm hmm, you think Mexico now just to spite me, yes?” Lucas let his smile grow warm and affectionate. Then he sobered. “And now you know that what I tell you I will do, I will do. I tell you now, John, this will always be the case.”

John looked away. 

Lucas knelt and unstrapped the ankle cuffs. “I’m going to get something for you to eat now,” he commented, and released the straps across the waist, chest, and wrists.

“Come. Up you go. Lie down,” he directed, and John collapsed onto the cot and rolled over.

Lucas wheeled the chair out of the room, and returned about a half hour later with a hot meal. Just outside the door, he stopped and took from his pocket a small bottle he’d procured from the commissary and squirted several drops into the food.

_Sorry about this, John, but I need you to display some ill effects,_ he thought, not pleased at this necessity. But two days of chills and fever, and some dry heaves would go a long way in confirming the illusion that Lucas had subjected John to a brutal session.

And it would soften him up for the next procedure.

He put the bottle back in his pocket and gave the plate to the guard to give to John. Then he went to report to Mischa.

 

* * *

 

Mischa listened attentively to Lucas’s report, as if he had not already seen and heard the entire session. He nodded and typed in the name Steve Franklin on his phone and sent it to a research analyst out on the floor. “We wait a moment. I think the other name is probably not impor-tant, but will check later.”

He reached into his jacket pocket and said, “I have some-thing for you, Lucas,” and handed Lucas an iPhone. 

Lucas took it in reverent hands. My God, he hadn’t held a cell phone in eight years. This was… beautiful. The technology had advanced so much… for a moment he was stymied, and Mischa chuckled and leaned forward, showing him how to unlock it, and some of the features.

Then he sat back and watched Lucas play with it.

“I give one to my daughter too, you know. She’s 15. Now I have some-thing I can take from her if she is bad.” He gave a chuckle. “Kids today, you take the phone they think you have taken their soul.” Then he grew serious. “Of course, any-thing you do on this phone, I know, see?” He held up his own phone and waggled a finger between his and Lucas’s. “They are synced, I have no-ti-fi-ca-tion. Use it for research while you induct your _porosnok._ Use it to contact me, anytime. See this icon here? Me, my phone. Call or text. I prefer text.”

Lucas had to control his breathing. He had keys. He had clothing. He had a watch and now a phone. Jesus, he felt almost human again.

This was his reward for torturing and questioning John Watson. He glanced up on the video feed, noting that John was curled up on his cot, shivering in his wet scrubs. Yes, this was the next phase. First you hurt, then you comfort. It helps to form the bond.

Mischa’s phone lit up and he inspected the incoming message. “Ah. It seems your work has borne fruit already. Steve Franklin has a fas-cin-ating list of contacts, particularly of vendors who visit embassies in Yemen, Oman, and the UAE. Several of those embassies have been targeted.”

He raised his eyes to Lucas. “Well done, Lucas.”

Lucas looked back at John on the flat screen. Was it possible John actually was what he had been working to portray him as? An unwitting source of information, traveling about with a charitable medical organization? His heartrate sped up. His training, combined with his natural instincts, kicked in. Like a dog on the scent, he knew what to do next.

“It could be coincidental,” he acknowledged, “but I need to get more names.”

Mischa nodded. “I leave it to you,” he smiled. “Ah, perhaps I should give you the contact information for our research department.”

Lucas was struck with an idea. “I want John’s phone. Can I--?”

Mischa gave him a rather admiring look. “I think I see where you go. Yes, I will have it de-livered.”

After Mischa left, Lucas spent the next hour feverishly researching bombings of embassies, both on the net and via the research contact. Just as he was finishing, an agent-–female, late 40s, grim—brought John Watson’s phone and wallet to Lucas in a plastic bag. Lucas immediately powered up the phone, but it was password protected and apparently no one had attempted to hack into it yet. Which confirmed what Lucas already knew: Mischa knew full well that John was merely a civilian. His whole purpose was to be a test for Lucas.

But what about Steve Franklin? How had it happened that—it hit Lucas suddenly, and he shook his head and chuckled, ashamed of himself Of course. Mischa was playing him the way he was playing John: convince him that his interrogations were actually important, and he’d double down on his captive, and lose sight of anything but chasing shadows. To turn him more thoroughly, make him feel important and valuable, after 8 years of being a lowly prisoner. All part of the procedure.

Very well. Lucas intended to pass his test and have it too. He mulled over his next steps, but the whole time, he kept an eye on the flat screen, monitoring the progress of John’s increasing medical distress. Finally, he pocketed both phones and went to get the blanket he’d prepared.


	13. Fever

John lay curled on his cot in abject misery. His scrubs were damp. The room was chill. He was shaking with tremors and his body ached. His head was heavy and hurting. His stomach twisted and he’d had diarrhea, though thankfully it seemed to be over now. He lay on his damp, stale cot and wished he could just pass out.

He heard keys jangle in the hallway and couldn’t even be bothered to stand. His eyes closed of their own accord.

Suddenly he heard the deep, soft tones of his interrogator. “Oh, look at this,” Lucas murmured over him. “Come, John, you cannot lie there in wet clothes, you’ll make it worse. Come.”

He opened his burning eyes to see Lucas bent over him, helping him sit up. John inhaled the subtle, pleasant scent of him.

“Come,” Lucas repeated, tugging John’s wet top off of him. John lifted his arms compliantly, too tired to care. But when Lucas tried to take his pants, John resisted a bit, automatically. “Come, John, I have seen you naked before,” Lucas said dispassionately, and after a minute John tipped over and let the other man pull his clothes off him as if he were a sleepy child.

Then the taller man lifted up a thick, soft comforter of blue and white stripes. He sat John up and wrapped it around him, and John gave a soft moan of happiness. It smelled so clean and fresh! It was warm! Lucas covered his shoulders with it, and John fairly wallowed in the softness. 

Suddenly, some sort of bizarre reaction borne of weakness, illness, and exhaustion kicked in, and John dissolved into sobs. His face crumpled and he simply bent his head and cried. He could not know how fierce the triumph was that coursed through Lucas at the sight. 

Lucas sat down next to John, pulled his torso over and into his arms, and maneuvered the blanket under his hips, wrapping him up like a cocoon. Then he cradled John’s upper body in his arms, letting the damp blond head come to rest on his own black-clad arm. John was lost in emotion.

After a moment, Lucas scooted back until he could lean against the wall, and dragged John with him, wrapping his arms about the bundle in the blanket, and squeezing tightly. He knew about moments like these, when your own body simply failed you, unexpectedly, and you dissolved. Moments like this, you felt as though you were coming apart and floating away, and if someone somewhere would just take a tight grip on you, and help you keep it together…

Lucas squeezed tighter. There had almost never been anyone there for him at those moments. Only once. And that time had been powerful. Too damned powerful.

But now he would do this for John, and John would be more his with every step they took together. He squeezed his _porosnok_ tight and held on, letting him sob until the shudders gradually died away. Weaknesses brought on by illness were usually quick to dissipate. He cradled John’s head and eventually brought his hand up to caress the short, blond hair.

“You have the after-effects, yes? A difficult session will bring this on sometimes,” he said softly. “It passes. You will recover, and then you will wonder why you insisted on being so stubborn,” he added with a smile.

John didn’t argue. He merely lay in the arms that held him, reveling in being warm and dry. The hand in his hair felt good. Amazing that it was the same hand that had grasped his hair and pulled it back so mercilessly that morning.

As if Lucas had read his mind, he suddenly took a thick handful of hair and pulled, not hard, not painfully, but firmly, pulling John’s head back until he opened his eyes and looked up. The two stared into each other’s eyes for a long moment. Lucas was fighting his impulses. To have John curled up, languishing in his arms in this weak and helpless way, brought out the very worst of his instincts. He wanted to take over the other man completely, and dominate him by every possible method. The heat literally rose inside of him.

Lucas had to lift his head and break eye contact, look out the window and count his breaths to get himself back under control. His hand relaxed its hold on John’s hair and sank to his neck, digging into the muscles in a slow, rough massage.

John closed his eyes again in bliss, utterly limp. He just didn’t care at that moment about his rights, his privacy, his dignity, anything. What mattered was what felt good.

Lucas swallowed and reminded himself of all the reasons he was not going to initiate any sexual contact with John while they were both in custody.

One, Mischa would know, and Lucas did NOT need Mischa knowing about this corner of his psyche. The Russian would use it against him instantly.

Two, it would seem like a weakness to John, a weakness in Lucas, this uncontrolled lust. There could be no weakness.

Three, he had been molested himself enough to know that molestation during torture actually weakened the potential for bonding. John’s dependency on him must transcend – or at least avoid -- such mundane matters as sex. 

So Lucas stared out the window, cradled John and squeezed him, and dug his fingers into the other man’s muscles for nearly a quarter of an hour. John soaked up his scent and his touch in grateful silence.

Finally, Lucas was calm enough to speak. “John, I want you to know that Steve Franklin’s name has been associated with activity that warrants further investigation on our part.” He looked down again. “This does not mean we are going to pick him up. Only that you are not the first person to give his name. We will investigate his contacts and see what else we can find, but we are all very glad that you were able to remember him.”

John lay with his eyes closed, listening. It seemed like the cramps in his stomach had lessened once Lucas was with him. Perhaps the warmth eased them. Perhaps he was distracted by the clean scent of him. 

Lucas added, “The name Mike Stamford does not bring up anything problematic. You mustn’t worry about him.”

John was relieved, although he was too weary and weak to bother demonstrating it.

“However,” Lucas began, “this business about Franklin does indicate that you have been used as a courier of information, possibly without you even knowing it. But you were obviously identified as someone to approach, and as such we are going to need you to remember other names.”

John sighed and shook his head in silent protest.

Lucas hid his smile. “I need the password to your email, John.”

John’s eyes opened. Every name of anyone who mattered to him was in that email account. Mary. His sister. His friends. His former commander and colleagues.

He drew himself up and away from Lucas, his eyes fixed on some far away point. 

“No,” he said firmly. 

Lucas was pleased. Another specific goal. Another opportunity to show Mischa that he had turned, and that he could use his skills to create cooperation. Another chance to make John Watson more his creature. Another chance to bring them both a step closer to freedom.

“You are tired,” he said, getting carefully to his feet and smoothing his clothing down. “Get some sleep. Keep the blanket.”

When he left, John was staring after him. Lucas reminded the guards that John was back on regular diet, and to feed him twice a day again. Then he left. It was time to let John become lonely again, for a while.

Lucas went to his room and into his bathroom. He wanted to jerk off, but he was certain there were hidden cameras and surveillance equipment in the room. Mischa would leave nothing to chance. So Lucas splashed more cold water on his face, and changed into his scrubs for sleeping in. He’d slept in them for 8 years now. It was comfortable. He hung his clothes up carefully, and laid his watch, his keys, and his phone, and John’s phone by the bedside table with precision. Then he stared at them. The accoutrements of a normal life. He was getting them back one by one. Mischa had even set him up with a small commissary account, to purchase niceties from. Torture had its rewards.

Finally, to distract himself, he looked through John’s file. What names did he want to elicit? He flipped the pages. James Sholto. Mary Morstan. Harriet Watson. Those were the big ones, the ones John would want to protect. Save them for later. For now, the next goal was for John to remember random businessmen he’d met while working with DWB. They more Lucas could convince John that he was indeed at the center of a violent information sharing cartel of soulless mercenaries, the more eagerly he would cooperate.

Once he’d learned to cooperate with Lucas, he must be made to give over every secret of his personal life. Meanwhile, his body must become the property of his interrogator. Not sexually—not that, not now. More like a dog who loves his owner, and accepts every caress with gratitude, and endures every kick with shame.


	14. Barter

_I think it is time for your porosnok to give more names,_ came Mischa’s text, four days after Lucas gave John the blanket.

Lucas had been picking through the prison library. He had several English classics checked out now, ready to begin creating the persona of the Russian Anglophile, for John to pick at. He read in the conference room, watching John on the monitor. He wanted very much to go and spend time in the company of his new toy, but it was essential that John spend time alone. Loneliness was a tool.

After thinking for a moment of the various times he had spent with Oleg, and the moments that had created his own dependency and longing, Lucas texted, _I’d like to take him outside to see the estuary._

_Why, Lucas._ Mischa responded.

Time for a bit of honesty. _That’s what Oleg used to do with me sometimes._

There was a pause. Finally, Mischa responded. _Very well but if you are not able to procure three names I would recommend that you consider voltage._

Lucas’s stomach went cold. If there was one thing he wanted to avoid, it was using electric shock on John. For one thing, it was traditional to go for the genitalia. Lucas tried very hard not to remember one particularly excruciating period where he had been subjected to shocks running from his groin to his feet. He’d pissed himself, moaning and begging— he’d dislocated a shoulder trying to escape the pain.

Lucas’s hands started to tingle with memory. This was one he’d tried to block out. Now he would have to face it again.

And it would be very difficult to mitigate this for John. He wondered, worrying, if Mischa had discovered how he had fudged the waterboarding. Or was he simply following a set pattern: Lucas must put John through the three favored methods: water-boarding, shock, beatings.

He braced himself to consider that this would be the case. If it was, he’d better prepare himself. Lucas set his books aside and went back to the research department to check out videos of Oleg’s use of electric shock. Particularly, he wanted to see his own.

Some of it was desensitizing, and he knew it. You watch it over and over until it doesn’t disturb you any more. But some of it was to relive the experience. If he was going to do it to John, he wanted to remember every single facet of it.

 

* * *

 

John was wrapped up in his blanket. It helped him block out that eternal florescent light. In fact, he was sleeping more and more now, and he knew full well it was a sign of depression, but… he was depressed, why deny it? When he was awake, he was trying to remember the names of the men he’d met in his various travels with DWB.

Remember embassy parties, he told himself. Meals at restaurants were too difficult to remember. But those mixers, one met interesting types there. Who was the fellow that was involved in advertising endorsements for foreign soccer players?

It was Lucas’s comment about soccer that made him remember. Brazil vs Mexico… this fellow had had a Spanish last name. He was Argentinian… John’s mind wandered, as it was prone to lately. Macias? His name was Macias. First name started with an A … Alejandro? Anthony? Andrew? Angel? There was an aspirated consonant, it seemed like, so… Alejandro or Angel.

John whispered the two names to himself several times. He was drowsy, though. And he wished Lucas would come. He dozed off.

 

* * *

 

Lucas, meanwhile, was sweating through the videos of electric shock torture. He started with Oleg’s. Again, he could see the calm method, the deliberate, passionless approach. He noted the use of the control box, starting with a low voltage, moving it progressively higher, eliciting louder screams with each application.

Lucas was not remotely aroused at the thought of making John scream with electric shock. He started thinking of ways and reasons to create a scenario where screams would not be expected, or could not be used as a gage by anyone watching.

Chewing on his lip, Lucas replayed the video, now watching the placement of the electrodes. They didn’t always go for the genitals, but it was preferred, clearly. The closer the probes were to one another, the more intense the current between them. Putting them very close together caused smoke to rise from the flesh.

He became aware that his heart was pounding. Fuck, he didn’t want anything to do with this.

But he steeled himself and watched the video of his own torture, making the calmest, most disengaged notes that he could.

Length of time: they varied from 30 minutes to 3 hours.

Location of probes: genitals, mouth, toes, nipples, buttocks… everywhere, really.

Position of victim: spread-eagled, usually blindfolded, tied to a set of box springs.

Length of time between shocks: extremely varied, no pattern. Meant to cause maximum distress if the victim didn’t know when the next shock was coming. 

In fact, Lucas took special note of how many times the victim was taken by surprise. It seemed to be an element.

He sat back and thought about it. Yes, the unexpected element. That made it worse.

Therefore if he must do this to John, the kindest thing he could do was to introduce some sort of pattern, or warning signal, or—something.

Lucas wondered if Mischa had ever studied it as he was studying it. He sighed and watched his own torment again, counting the shocks he was subjected to. In a one hour session he was subjected to seventeen vicious jolts. Seventeen! Fuck, that was too much. He remembered it only as a haze of agony now. It came back to him in dreams sometimes. He didn’t want to do that to John.

How to … how to manage this? Suddenly, he realized that he had received one last message from Mischa.

_Much as I respect Olegs work I would like to see you develop your own style._

Lucas rubbed his forehead. Alright. He was going to take that as permission to do things his own way. He brooded further, glancing up at the sleeping bundle of blanket on the monitor. Already John was more eager to cooperate, as long as it didn’t involve his friends. But Lucas must make John choose him over his friends.

He stared at the blanket. The blanket was a reward. His own phone was a reward. There were rewards, and there were punishments.

Lucas drummed his fingers on the table. If he used the electric shock for punishment, rather than to elicit information, he could use it in a different manner than the others. He grew very still, his mind running over the matter.

When he finally gathered up his materials and returned them, he had developed a very methodical plan for getting himself and John through this next hurdle.


	15. The Estuary

John was pacing in his cell. He’d slept all he could and now he was climbing the walls. His family must be wondering if he was dead. He reviewed the possible reactions of his colleagues to his abrupt disappearance. The raid had not been a particularly dramatic one: he was simply snatched from the hotel with three other men by the Russian police, put into a car, and brought to a facility. From there, after about 28 hours, he’d been brought here. He didn’t even know if the hotel management would tell anyone inquiring after him what had happened.

They might believe he’d been mugged, killed, and thrown into the nearest river.

John rubbed his face. The more he thought about it, the more he was afraid that the very nature of his disappearance meant that he was unlikely to reappear.

He stood for a moment, his hands over his face. Suddenly, he heard footsteps in the passageway. He turned to the door.

When the guards unlocked it, Lucas entered the room. John’s heart gave a jump. He was increasingly conflicted about Lucas. Was the other man bringing him a hot meal or taking him to be waterboarded again? The Lady or the Tiger? Yet either way, the appearance of Lucas meant human interaction, human touch.

Without realizing it, John took two steps toward Lucas. His skin seemed to be nearly crawling with eagerness. He looked his interrogator over quickly. Dressed in black, as usual, clean and well-groomed, smelling wonderful. Lucas was carrying a pair of fuzzy boots and a sweater, and he looked down at John with a benign smile.

“I wondered if you would like to go for a walk outside and see the estuary,” Lucas said.

John hesitated, wondering if this was code for, “We are taking you outside and shooting you now.”

Lucas tipped his head, noting John’s hesitation. “Just a walk, John. You will come back alive and undamaged, I promise.”

John’s nervousness faded and he accepted the boots and sweater. Lucas waited, and then offered John his arm in a rather courtly manner. 

“If you do not wish to be in handcuffs, you must have my arm at all times. The guards will accompany us but we will have a bit of privacy to… talk.” Lucas finished.

John slid his arm through the other man’s, noting how hard it was. Lucas wasn’t bulky, but he was as hard as a rock. John was fit enough for a doctor approaching forty, but Lucas felt like he did push-ups every day. John allowed Lucas to walk him down the passageways, turning left, and then right, and then going up a few steps. They encountered no one. For a facility of its size, it was sparsely inhabited, John thought.

Finally, they were cutting through what looked like a prison cafeteria, and then down another hallway… and at last through a simple side exit that led outside.

John lifted his head and inhaled the cool, early autumn air. He hadn’t been outside in… what… three weeks? He’d lost track.

The sky was gray and overcast, but soft, and the facility sat near a river that featured a flat, sandy spread of brackish water framed by low dunes with sharp, long blades of silvery-green grass in intermittent patches. There were quite a few birds of varying types picking along the water, and a breeze that blew in refreshingly.

“Are you feeling better?” Lucas asked.

John nodded. “Yes.”

The ground where they walked had grass that was clearly mowed regularly, but Lucas guided John away from the facility, past a parking lot, toward the shore where the grass faded into sand.

“Have you been thinking about what I asked you to think about?” Lucas inquired.

John nodded. “I remember another name. Well, kind of, I have it narrowed down…”

Lucas did not ask the name. “I have found,” he said, “that when trying to remember things, it helps to search associations. Start with a topic, such as… pets. Do you remember talking about pets with anyone. Or languages. Do you remember anyone who spoke several languages. Or… colleges. Did you talk about what university you went to?”

John nodded. Then he stopped walking, and Lucas stopped with him, as attentive as a dance partner.

“Am I ever going to leave here?” John asked, looking Lucas in the eye.

The taller man didn’t flinch away, but directed his deep, mysterious gaze down at John. “It is my hope and my intention that you will, and before very long,” Lucas said, in his barely-there accent.

But then he did look away. “It would help if you would give me the password to your e-mail account. I have already asked you once.”

John clenched his teeth and held still. It was actually difficult to disappoint Lucas now, although he did not note this consciously, any more than he was conscious of the fact that he was eager for Lucas to touch him, or that he’d relaxed immediately when Lucas had promised no harm to him.

Lucas looked back at him. “And now I have asked you twice,” he pointed out, with only a tinge of remonstrance.

John stared out at the water stubbornly. Lucas hid his smile, although anyone who knew him well would have noted the way his lower eyelids rose slightly. But no one knew him well. Not anymore.

“Still, you said you had remembered a name,” Lucas said eventually.

John brightened a touch, as if pleased to have something to offer. “There was an Alejandro Macias… or an Angel. I can’t remember which. But he had athletic contracts… endorsement deals or something—“

And Lucas listened attentively, and guided John along the dunes. Behind them, two expressionless prison guards hung back about 30 feet. Really, a very respectful distance.

As they walked, Lucas looked down at the man obediently holding his arm. So compact. So neat and tidy. His hair lay so straight and fine and flat, not like his own that was thick and full of cowlicks, and tended toward a certain unsavory air. Lucas knew that all he had to do was go without shaving for 18 hours and he’d look like a criminal.

But John. John looked respectable even in prison scrubs. 

Lucas noted the various names John mentioned, committing them to memory and already building a drama which would unfold within… he decided that 48 more hours should do it.

“This is very good, John. I want you to know that I appreciate it, and I am making a note of it all. But… I do want that email password.”

This time it was Lucas who stopped, and he took John’s arm in his hand, and wrapped the other arm around his shoulders. Nothing rough or threatening, but drawing him close and bending his head to peer down into John’s steady, gray-blue eyes. “This is the third time I ask. You see I am counting.”

If John only knew why Lucas was counting. Six, Lucas thought. I want to ask you six times.

Six was better than seventeen.

But John had no idea, and took an impatient breath. “Why do you need that?”

Lucas smiled, and it was a rather dark smile.

“I need access to all your personal correspondence, John. I need to know the inside of your mind. I want to believe that you are an innocent man, and that any information you passed on was done unwittingly. I want to lobby for your release to my superiors. But I need to see your letters. I cannot help but wonder what you are hiding.”

John closed his eyes and found that it was not uncomfortable to have Lucas’s arm heavy and warm around his shoulders, or to have the other man’s hand on his wrist. Suddenly he was very tired.

“Look. A heron,” Lucas said, and John opened his eyes to see a large bird lift off and take wing.

They watched it go. Then Lucas urged John gently to walk again.

“Where were you educated?” Lucas asked suddenly.

“What, it’s not in my file?” John rejoined with an unexpected touch of mockery.

Lucas gave an amused huff. “Oh, you test me. You went to University of London, and then Barts.”

“Why did you ask if you already knew?” John asked absently, looking out over the water again.

“To see if you would lie.” Lucas answered immediately.

“Why would I lie?” John said.

“Ah yes. I forgot you only lie if you have a reason,” Lucas said in a mildly teasing manner, squeezing John closer to him.

John gave an exasperated little laugh. “I don’t—doesn’t everyone?”

Lucas gave him a smile and then sobered. “What is your email password, John?”

“It’s Fuckoff.” John said irritably.

Lucas had to grin, but smothered it was quickly as he could. “This is four times I ask you now,” and there was a trace of warning this time.

They walked some more in silence.

Then Lucas said, “I was accepted to Oxford. When I was seventeen.”

John looked at him as if he’d just been about to say something unpleasant (and he was, something about _Oxford trains Russian torturers now, wonderful,_ ) but he stopped himself and listened.

“I was not allowed to go. My father… he had a health issue. I had to stay here. I was educated in Moscow.” Lucas lied.

“But you wanted to go,” John probed. 

Lucas nodded. “Very much. I loved British literature. I wanted to study Dickens and Hardy in the land of their birth. But I could not.”

“Lucas, the Obscure,” John joked.

“Oh, you mock me. How nice. Look around you, John. You too are far from the madding crowd.”

They shared a wry smile, and Lucas became aware of a desire to wrap his arms around the smaller man and simply squeeze him, and mouth his neck roughly.

He conquered the urge and turned them around, back toward the facility.

“Hardy’s okay, but Dickens is over-rated,” John commented. “Trollop’s more fun.”

“Trollop is more conservative,” Lucas answered.

“He just tells a good story,” John protested.

“Better than Bleak House?” Lucas scoffed.

John gave an acceding nod and watched a flock of seagulls lift off.

Lucas put his face down by John’s ear.

“Tell me the password,” he whispered coaxingly, as if it were merely a flirtatious game they shared.

“Not going to,” John informed him.

“That is five times I ask.” Lucas remarked, satisfied.

They followed their own steps back. “You have read Richardson?” Lucas asked.

John’s lips quirked depreciatingly. “We had to read a few letters of CLARISSA in my second year.”

“Ah,” said Lucas approvingly. “Now there was a power struggle. He tested her until she bested him.”

“Lovelace was a rapist,” John said shortly.

“Still, you cannot say he won, although he certainly gave his all,” Lucas smiled.

John looked up at him. “You relate to him, don’t you?” He asked suddenly.

Lucas shut his mouth, feeling all at once as though the conversation was dangerous. That John would be able to see through him if he revealed any more.

They came to the door of the facility and Lucas let John pause and stare one more time out at freedom. Then he escorted John back to his cell, keeping his hands on him at all times. John made no effort to avoid Lucas’s touch.

Before Lucas left, he gave John a serious look. “I ask one more time. What is your email password?”

“Lovelace,” John said defiantly.

Lucas was quiet for a meaningful moment. And then he said, “How many times did I ask you?”

“Six,” John answered promptly.

“Six,” Lucas agreed, his eyes taking on a rather hot gleam. Then he took back the boots, but left John the sweater and departed the cell.

When he was gone, John buried his nose in the sweater and inhaled deeply. It smelled like Lucas.


	16. Lucas and Voltage

Lucas stood in the interrogation room reserved for questioning involving electric shock. It was a singularly ominous looking room. The walls and floor were concrete, like the others. But this one had a queen-sized set of bare box springs fastened to the wall with metal hooks. It was on an angle, so that the victim tied to it would be on their feet, but leaning back enough to be off balance. The angle, Lucas estimated, was about 110 degrees. Still upright enough to look pleadingly up at the face of their tormenter. There were leather cuffs at all four corners.

Generally, the victim was face up, but Lucas went and lay face down on it experimentally. Not comfortable, but no sharp objects. He pushed himself off it again and looked around. There was a wooden stool, so the torturer could sit down if he got tired.

There was a control box nearby with a dial that set the voltage, and hooked to it were two probes on long leads that would allow an interrogator to apply them both to any area of the victim’s body he desired. The current would flow between the two probes. Apply one to the victim’s penis and the other to a nipple and the current would rip between them, creating a line of pain.

But the level of pain depended on the distance between the probes, and the setting of the control box.

So, Lucas determined, taking off his shirt… if he set the dial at its lowest setting and put the probes as far apart as he could reach, it should allow him to begin his experiment with the least possible anxiety. He adjusted the dial accordingly and balanced one probe on the back of his outstretched hand. The last thing he wanted was for his muscles to seize up, clutching the probes involuntarily, unable to let go, while he fried himself into a coma.

Cautiously, he let the other probe touch his shoulder. Immediately a prickling vibration zipped from his shoulder to his hand. He jumped, but didn’t drop the probe. That was actually not terribly painful. It danced on the edge of pain, but it was quite bearable. He touched the probe to his shoulder several more times, ascertaining that if you knew it was coming, and you knew what to expect, it was uncomfortable, but little more.

Now he wanted to shorten the distance between the probes, preferably over the thicker muscles, but after several awkward maneuvers, he finally had to admit to himself that he couldn’t do this well on his arms. Shedding his pants, Lucas stood in his shorts and socks, his prison tattoos visible in all their glory. He applied the probes to himself, one at the hip and one lower down on the thigh.

The sensation that flicked through him was a little closer to pain. The muscles contracted tightly in protest. The skin felt hot.

Yet, it was bearable. This was not the setting the dial had been on, he was sure, when Oleg had questioned him some years ago. And he’d put a thin metal rod in Lucas’s penis. It was horrific. He’d wondered if his genitalia would be permanently damaged, although it wasn’t, he was later able to ascertain.  
But he had no interest in doing that to John. He was going to avoid internal organs, fragile tissue, and delicate bones that could literally snap if the muscles seized up hard enough. That said, it eventually fell to him to admit that this left only the upper back, thighs and buttocks. And even the upper back was perilously close to the heart. Lucas was no expert, but he was pretty sure that “heart” and “electricity” were not a good combination except under close medical supervision.

And Mischa’s most recent texts seemed to indicate impatience.

Thighs and buttocks it would have to be, Lucas decided, and he was really not pleased. This was going to skate very close to sexual molestation in John’s mind. Lucas resented this pressure on his personal agenda for John Watson.

But it couldn’t be helped. With a wry glance at the camera on the ceiling, Lucas dropped his shorts and placed one probe on his right hip, and then touched the left probe to his left hip. Immediately, a stinging tingle snapped smartly through the muscles of his gluteus maximus, and gave his anus a sharp nip as well. He let out a bark of surprise and dropped the probes.

That was a very peculiar sensation. And that was the lowest setting. He took a deep breath, bent and picked up the probes again, and applied them a second time, trying to hold them in place for a count of three. His teeth clamped shut involuntarily, and when he finally jerked the probes away from his flesh, he was breathing rather quickly.

When he’d recovered himself, Lucas stepped to the control box and turned the knob to the next setting up. He was going to know for himself exactly what he was subjecting John to. Or at least have a taste of it.

 

Lucas emerged from the room fully dressed about 20 minutes later, having ascertained that he would go no higher than setting 3 (of the six), and that he would allow the longest recovery time he could between jolts. Those were the two concessions he could make to John: recovery time and predictability. 

It would still be frightening and painful. But Lucas hoped to achieve several things with his particular approach. One, that John would learn never to refuse Lucas again. Two, that he would also learn that Lucas’s word could be trusted. Three, that Mischa would see that Lucas was perfectly capable of subjecting John to brisk and humiliating torture. And four, to get that email password, at last.

Lucas returned to his room and sat down rather gingerly, because the muscles felt fairly abused, and flipped open his laptop. He typed in the exact scenario he was going to put to John tomorrow. It must sound urgent. It must sound dire. It should feature helpless civilians in immediate danger, and the names John had mentioned ought to be prominent.

It should seem to give an interrogator a damn good reason to strap a naked man to box springs and zap his buttocks till he was nearly shitting himself (which research indicated did sometimes happen. Lucas didn’t want that, but he braced himself for the possibility. It would at least impress Mischa.)

He opened and closed his jaws several times, noting that he’d clenched his teeth pretty tightly when on setting 3. He’d have to get something to put in John’s mouth so he didn’t crack his teeth. In fact, that was an excellent idea. It would be his signal to John to brace himself. It would seem to muffle any screams, but if there were no screams, it might explain that as well.

Lucas decided a clean, wet washcloth would do for that.


	17. Lucas and John and Voltage

When the cell door opened the next morning, John looked up with undisguised eagerness. It died when he saw that Lucas was pushing the wheelchair. 

Already he knew what that meant. Lucas entered the cell somberly, his eyes regarding John intently. The guards retreated out of his way and into the passageway behind him.

John was immediately anxious, but not as horrified as he had been the first time. Already, he was certain that Lucas did not intend to kill or permanently maim him.

Well… relatively certain.

Lucas placed the wheelchair before John, who still sat on the cot as if he’d turned to stone. Then the interrogator sat on the metal chair opposite him. Ritual time, he thought, and his own heart had sped up too. He couldn’t deny how alive he felt at this moment.

“John, I must tell you that the names you have given us were entered into our data-base and correlated, and the result was alarming. They have all been in contact with individuals who have in common a private school for diplomats’ children in Vladikavkaz.”

John stared at the wheelchair. “I don’t understand,” he said, very softly.

Lucas leaned forward. “Two of them registered children at the school. The third has a vending machine contract there.”

John swallowed, listening.

“This morning, both of the children did not report to the school. The vendor is scheduled to be there at noon. This seems to us very much like an imminent terrorist attack.”

“Close the school,” John said instantly.

“… it has been evacuated,” Lucas improvised. “But our personnel are in there now, and if a bomb goes off… their lives matter too, John.”

John didn’t look at him. He just sat, breathing, for a few moments. Then, “What do you want from me?”

“I want your email password. I have already asked you six times.” Lucas said promptly.

John looked away impatiently. “There is nothing in my messages to my ex-girlfriend, my sister, or my mum that will help you.” 

Lucas stared at him. “That may be, but I will not know that till I see for myself. And at this moment, John, I must tell you that I am angry with you. I am angry that you make me ask and ask for something when you know the urgency with which we are faced.” He kept his tone calm, but stern.

John said nothing, and Lucas was pleased. Again, it was a matter of timing. And there were certain procedures that must be gotten through. It was for the best if John did not succumb till after Lucas had created the display of force that Mischa expected.

“So I am going to tell you exactly what to expect. I am going to ask you to remove your scrubs and sit in the wheelchair. I am going to strap you into it and take you to a room where we question people in matters of utmost urgency. This is not a matter for the tilt-boards. And, I will be honest with you, John, I have decided that you warrant punishment for defying my direct request.”

John looked at him once, and then looked away again, his face set. But the hurt and betrayal was clear in his eyes.

Lucas felt warmth generating inside of him. His voice softened. “But John, I will not surprise you. I will inform and explain to you every step of the way. You will learn to trust my word, and you will learn, I hope, to trust my judgment as well, and not withhold information from me that I deem essential.”

John stared at the floor.

“Now, I want you to remove your scrubs and sit in the chair and offer me your wrists to strap down,” Lucas said gently. “Here,” he took the blue and white blanket and spread it on the chair, covering the seat and the back completely. “I’ll wrap you in this, but where we are going, your scrubs will not be necessary.”

John looked toward the door where the guards waited outside.

“I could have them do it, but I would rather not. It would be violent.” Lucas added. He waited.

John slowly rose up and pulled his shirt over his head, dropping it on the cot. Then he shed his pants, not looking at Lucas. Finally he turned and lowered himself into the chair. Lucas wrapped the blanket around him snugly, covering his nakedness. Then he knelt before John and placed his wrists under the straps, touching his arms reassuringly as he arranged the blanket around him carefully. Then the ankles. Then the chest and waist, tightly over the blanket.  
John seemed to sink into the same rather hypnotized state he had the first time, and Lucas began to hope that this would always be the case. He liked it.

He wheeled John down the passageway, into the elevator, and down to the level of the interrogation rooms. When they were inside the gruesome space with the box springs, John’s face turned white. Lucas gave the guards their instructions in Russian, and they retreated to the hallway to man the door and give Lucas the privacy he wanted.

Lucas closed the door, drew up the stool, and sat down facing John. He wanted John to relax a little, and as long as he was strapped in the chair and Lucas was sitting opposite him, nothing would happen.

“I’m going to explain this to you very thoroughly, John. You are going to be face down on the box springs. You are going to be restrained. I am going to take those two probes and place them on your skin. The current will run between them. I will not raise the current to the level where you could be burned or permanently damaged. But I will get every name you know. “

He paused to see if John had anything to say, but he was staring into space as he had done before the waterboarding.

“In addition, I will make sure you know when I am expecting an answer and when I am simply reminding you that you made me ask a question six times. I will not surprise you. You’ll be warned before every application of the probes. And you will give me the names, and you will give me your email password. But nothing you say will prevent me from my six reminders. Do you understand?”

John didn’t appear to be breathing. Lucas put both hands on his face. “John, you will survive this. But you will learn from it as well, I hope.”

He waited to see if there would be a response, but there was none. He nodded.

Then he removed the straps from John’s ankles, torso, and wrists. “Come. Stand.” He wrapped his arms around his naked captive’s shoulders and guided him to the box springs. “Lean forward carefully … hands up. Give me your wrist—“

Numbly, John allowed himself to be strapped to the box springs. He shifted a bit, trying to find a way to lie that didn’t involve wires pressing into his tender bits. Lucas waited, letting him get as comfortable as he could. Then he went to the control box, made sure the voltage was set to its lowest setting, and brought the probes with him as he came to stand by John. He reached over and dragged the wooden stool closer so he could lay the probes on it between applications. It was his intent that this session last for a very long time. What it lacked in high voltage, Lucas had determined, it would make up for in length and repetition.

He set the probes on the stool and placed both his hands on John’s shoulder blades, letting the warmth of his hands sink into the cool, quivering skin.

“When you feel both of my hands on you, you know that I do not have the probes in my hands and that no application is coming. Do you understand?”

John’s face was dug into the wires, and he was breathing fast.

“Answer me.” Lucas said sharply. “Do you understand?”

“Yes,” John said faintly.

“Good. Now. You are to answer every question I put to you. How many times did I ask you for your email password?”

“Six,” John said.

“Good. What was the first name you gave me, of the man with the sports team endorsement contracts?”

“Alejandro Macias.”

“Was it Alejandro or Angel?”

“I... I think it was Alejandro.”

Lucas led John through a series of semi-familiar questions for several minutes, keeping his hands on the other man’s back the entire time, sometimes gliding them slowly over the twitching, responsive skin. Occasionally his eyes drifted down to the buttocks that were so close. There was definitely heat inside his chest.

“Now I am going to give you two application with the probes. I am going to put one on your left shoulder, here,” Lucas tapped with his finger, and one down here,” he tapped John’s left buttock, which flinched. “The current will run in a line here,” he traced his finger down John’s shuddering back.

“It will be on the lowest setting. It will sting but you will not find it unbearable.”

Lucas picked up the probes and placed the first one on John’s shoulder. “Until I touch the other one, you should feel nothing. I am applying the other one… now.”

He touched the probe briefly to John’s buttock and heard the faint crackle of electricity, and John’s gasp. Then he removed it.

“Now the other side,” He said, and repeated the process.

Then he put the probes back on the stool and smoothed his hands over John’s back. 

“You alright?” he asked lightly.

“Yes,” John said, his eyes wide.

“Good. Tell me again about the itinerary after you left Yemen.”

He led John through another series of questions, his hands on John’s ribs possessively, occasionally moving up and down in a caress.

“Very well done, John. Now I am going to bring the focus of the probes down to where they will remain for the duration of the session. I am going to use them exclusively on the muscles of your hips. You will excuse the connotations, I hope, but this is where the muscle is thickest and there are no organs or small bones. It is the safest place. And I have to admit, it seems appropriate to me because, in case I have forgotten to mention it…. You made me ask for your email password six times.”

John dug his fingers into the wires and shifted uneasily on the springs. Lucas lifted his hands from his captive’s skin and picked up the probes. “I have not changed the setting. I am applying the first probe to your left hip. Now I will apply the other on the count of three. One, two, three.”

The electricity flicked through John’s buttocks and he gave a louder gasp, arching into the box springs.

“Is a very strange sensation, yes?” Lucas asked amusedly. “And again,” he applied the probe for only two seconds, watching John writhe against it. “I think one more,” he said, and made John dance against the springs. Lucas could feel his own heart pounding. He hadn’t expected to enjoy this, but there was no denying how utterly focused he felt at this moment.

“I’m putting the probes down now,” he murmured, and placed his hands on John’s hips, soothing the spot where the probes had touched. John was breathing hard.

“Now. Let us talk about the second name you gave me, of the advertising executive that you met on the train. What day was that?”

Lucas went on this way for some time, eliciting information, leading John in circles with questioning, and then pausing to apply the low but prickling current to his hips. Always, he warned John first. Always, he gave him a few moments between jolts to rest. Finally, when John was warmed up from writhing and squirming, Lucas felt ready to address the six acts of defiance.

“Now, John, I want to talk about your email password. First I am going to turn the current up to the next level. There are six levels. This will be number 2.”

He moved the dial and returned. John was trying to look over his shoulder at him but eventually gave it up and put his face to the wires again.

“This will be more painful, I cannot deny. I am applying the probes to the same location. Here is one and here is the other.”

John let out a cry as the current snapped through his quivering cheeks with undeniable bite. The muscles clenched and the thin tissue between them stung fiercely.

“Very brief but very noticeable, yes, John? Answer me.”

“Yes,” gasped John, clawing at the bedsprings.

“Yes. I am going to give you three taps at level 2. They will be very quick in succession, like: tap… tap… tap.”

Lucas followed up with exactly what he had described. John rutted against the springs, trying to escape the wicked line of voltage crackling through his bum.

Lucas put down the probes and placed his hands on the quivering haunches. “I do this so that you learn that I will do exactly as I say,” he commented, pleased with how John looked stretched out on the rusty springs. His hair was slightly darker now, damp with sweat. Lucas lifted one hand to caress John’s hair.

“You’re doing well. Now I think we go to level three.”

“No, don’t. Don’t do this,” John said unsteadily.

“But I have to, John. You defied me six times.”

Lucas turned the dial on the control and returned to John. He brought forth the wet cloth he’d prepared in advance and twisted it. “Put this between your teeth. I don’t want you cracking them. Open. I said open.”

John opened his mouth and accepted the cloth, panting with anxiety.

“Good. Now I am going to apply this jolt for three seconds, and it will be painful, and you are free to scream if you want to, John. On three—“

The electricity crackled, and John seemed to try and climb the box springs, keening into the washcloth. 

Lucas put the probes down and said, “That was one. But we leave it for now and go back to questioning level.” He removed the cloth from John’s mouth and lowered the dial to the lowest setting again. He was positively enjoying this.

He really hadn’t expected to. But there was such power in those little probes, and it took so little effort on his part. Touch them to the skin and John squirms and groans and jerks, and those cheeks twitch and wobble—

Lucas alternated between soothing caresses with his hands, and teasing taps with the probes at low level, just painful enough to make John gasp and twitch. Then he’d ask the pointless, meaningless questions again.

When he was ready, he informed John that the dial was going to three again, and he was going to endure another reminder of his failure to reveal his email password. He put the cloth back in John’s mouth and let him prepare himself. Then Lucas gave his buttocks a searing, four second lash that made John cry out hoarsely.

He put the probes down and ran his hands all over John’s back and buttocks, petting him until his sobbing breathes abated. He took his time. He was teaching John, and learning himself. At one point he realized that he had a diamond hard erection, and then out of curiosity leaned around to see if John did too.

John had a semi-hard one, and Lucas wasn’t sure if it was arousal or just a coping mechanism. He didn’t mention it, or fondle it, though he wanted to very badly. But that would be unprofessional. He smiled and returned to his position behind John, who was limp against the springs now, taking the rest that Lucas offered, feeling those warm hands soothing his ribs and arms and back.

Eventually, Lucas informed him that it was time for his third Level 3 reminder not to withhold information, and John dug his hands into the springs and let out an agonized shout as Lucas punished him for his transgressions.

John was sweating freely now, and Lucas put the probes down and informed him that he was just going to towel him off. It occurred to him that the moisture might worsen the sensation, and although that would probably be preferable for a torturer, Lucas did not want John experiencing anything that he had not carefully planned for and rehearsed. It was a control issue, and Lucas was surprising himself with his own level of commitment to absolute control of John’s experience. Even the sweat was competition. 

John hooked his fingers in the springs and gasped for breath as Lucas toweled him off gently, but thoroughly, including parting his buttocks and wiping between them. He should have felt ashamed but for some reason, he was merely grateful for every merciful gesture. And he should have hated the man behind him, but he didn’t. He was, however, very focused on the man behind him. His ears strained for every word and his skin seemed to have extra nerve endings that followed the touch of the other man’s hands like a strange, sea plant with anemones that gathered around sensation.

His mind was on nothing whatsoever but Lucas, and himself, and what he was experiencing.

“Now I return the control to the lowest setting, and we talk about the South African man who made the very generous donation, and you sat with him at dinner in Kuwait.”

By now, John’s tolerance had increased, and the low-level voltage crackling through his buttocks was more like a prodding finger pushing inside of him rudely than an actual pain. He bit his lip and squirmed around it, concentrating on accepting it and not tensing up, breathing through it.

“Yes, it is a matter of perspective, is it not, John?” Lucas remarked in amusement, noting every subtle shift in his subject’s reactions. He was profoundly aroused, but mentally rather detached, and his stomach seemed to positively sing with contentment. Like John, he was utterly focused on this experience.

Suddenly he wanted to test John’s obedience to him. “I am going to place the probes against your skin again, and I want you to endure it for as long as you can. When you can stand no more, say my name,” Lucas directed. “Take a moment. Good. And… now,” he placed the probes and watched John’s back bunch and gather as he strained against the cuffs. His head fell back and he was biting his lips.

But what fascinated Lucas was that John did not cry out his name until … by Lucas’s count it was 7 seconds of continuous application. He was actually obeying and enduring as much as he could at Lucas’s command.

He put the probes down and ran his hands lovingly over his captive. “You are a tough little shit, John,” he breathed admiringly. “That was impressive.” And we are going to do it again, he thought contentedly.

When Lucas was finally willing to consider ending the session, John had endured his six punishing, searing volts, and screamed himself hoarse around the wet cloth. He had learned to endure low level voltage up to a count of 9. Lucas looked at his watch in satisfaction. He was fairly certain Mischa wouldn’t sit through the whole 2 hours watching. The procedure was not that riveting unless one was the kinky type, in which case that video could probably make money on the internet.

There was only one issue left. “Now, finally, we will have your email password,” Lucas decided. “But first, you want a drink of water?”

John nodded, his face crumpled up as if he were trying not to sob. Lucas caressed his back and buttocks for a moment and then went to the deep sink. There were paper cups there (for the interrogators) and he filled one and brought it around to John, who gulped it down eagerly.

“Thank you, “ he whispered automatically, and Lucas smiled at him.

“Whatever you need, John,” he said with true affection. Then he remembered his goal. “As long as I get what I need,” he added.

“Now I put the control at Level 2 and I am going to tap, tap, tap, tap, tap until you say that password. You may anticipate that I will not stop until I get that password,” he warned.

John took a deep breath and braced himself, and Lucas did exactly as he promised.

Every tap was a punishing crack that lit up John’s arse like fireworks, and Lucas set up a steady rhythm and simply kept going and kept going while John danced and writhed and strained until finally, he cried out, “MARY1203! MARY1203!”

Lucas stopped immediately and put the probes down. He put his hands on his captive’s back and soothed him ardently, petting and stroking him from shoulders to buttocks until John was sobbing in relief and gratitude and defeat, all at once.

But what Lucas was thinking, with cold, jealous resentment, was, “Who the fuck is Mary…”


	18. Closer to Free

Lucas kept one hand on John’s back while he fished the phone out of his pocket. “What is the code to unlock the phone,” he asked calmly.

John swallowed. “It’s the same. MARY1203.”

Lucas looked up at him in amusement. “You use the same password for both? Now I know you are innocent.”

John just sighed and lay vanquished under Lucas’s grip. 

Lucas concentrated on the phone, typing awkwardly with his thumb because he didn’t want to take his hand off John. After a moment, all the secrets of John’s phone and email lay open to him. He inhaled with satisfaction and put the phone back into his pocket.

Now he returned his attention to John. “You see?” He said quietly, stroking John comfortably. “You simply obey and answer and all is well.”

Lucas released John’s wrists and ankles from the cuffs and helped him hobble to the wheelchair. When he sank down to the seat, John let out a groan of pain.

“Skin?” asked Lucas, concerned.

“Muscles,” John answered, heaving a sigh.

“Ah. We will get you back to your bed.” Lucas promised, and strapped John into the chair, pulling the straps tighter than usual. As if he wanted to let John know that just because the session was over, didn’t mean Lucas was no longer maintaining control over him. 

John closed his eyes and let his head sink back a bit. He looked drawn and exhausted. Lucas stared down at him, aware that he could, if he wanted, do anything to him. Interrogators raped prisoners regularly. It was not frowned upon. Sergei considered it a perk of the job, and Anton used it as a… procedural element, he would say. Only Oleg had refrained, which was why Oleg had conquered a larger segment of Lucas’s psyche. The other two, he just hated.

But at this moment, there was not much Lucas wanted more than to sink his painfully aroused cock into John’s stinging, over-sensitized anus, and just finish him off psychologically. Utter domination. And for Lucas, orgasm. Relief. John in his arms, gasping and grunting…

_No. Too soon,_ Lucas told himself, inhaling carefully.

John opened his eyes and the two men suddenly locked gazes. Lucas stopped breathing, stopped moving, and just stared into John’s eyes, and John stared back, unwavering.

“Can I go back to my cell now?” John asked, after a minute.

Lucas felt a bit of a cold let-down in his gut, but nodded affably, hiding it well.

“Just take a bit more water,” he suggested, filling the cup from the sink and holding it firmly to John’s lips until he’d drunk it all.

Then he went around behind John to steer him out of the interrogation room, to the elevator, and back to his cell. Once Lucas had (slowly, reluctantly) released John from the straps, the smaller man crawled painfully onto the cot, still nude.

“You want your scrubs?” Lucas asked. 

John shook his head no and held up one arm for the blanket. 

Lucas brought it and wrapped him up in it obligingly, wishing he could be that blanket for a while. Then John turned on his cot and found the sweater Lucas had left with him. He pulled it to his chest, under the blanket, as if he wanted all the thick fabric he could get bundled around him. Lucas watched as John curled up in a fetal position around the sweater. Then he tucked the blanket around him more thoroughly.

He stood back a moment, dissatisfied. He didn’t want to leave at all. But John closed his eyes, shutting Lucas out, and after a moment, he turned and pushed the wheelchair out of the cell without speaking.

In the passageway, Lucas fought the urge to go straight to his room, strip off his clothes, and beat off. He wanted to dearly. His balls were aching now. Suddenly he realized the level of tension and exhaustion in his frame. The aftermath of the session had left its mark on him as well as John. He wanted relief, and then sleep.

But he was almost certain that Mischa would know. Finally, cursing his situation, Lucas headed for the small conference room.

Unsurprisingly, Mischa was there, calmly watching the flat screen as if he were waiting for Lucas to join him.

Lucas entered the room, and Mischa, with a slight smile, said, “Look.”

They both regarded the flat screen intently. After a moment, Lucas realized that John was doing just exactly what he himself would like to be doing. Curled under the blanket, face buried in Lucas’s sweater, he was quietly, discreetly masturbating.

Lucas felt his stomach doing revolutions of triumph. His eyes burned. When he became aware that Mischa was watching his reaction, he nodded. “Coping mechanism,” he said. 

“I think he likes you, Lucas.” Mischa said teasingly in his guttural voice.

“I want him to,” Lucas admitted, heat burning him up from inside.

Mischa nodded thoughtfully. “I must say, when I told you to develop your own style, I had no idea of the in-no-vation you would display. You have made him yours in a very short time.”

Lucas sat down at the table. “Is his information really valuable or are you just stringing me like I’m stringing him?” He asked bluntly.

Mischa smirked. “Just stringing,” he admitted good-humoredly. “I give you enough string to tie him with.” He added drolly.

Lucas swallowed at the thought of tying John up. Wrapping him in rope, creating spider webs for him to twist in while Lucas stood over him and did… well… anything, really.

“I would like to see more of your work,” Mischa hinted. “I know, I know—“ he held up his big mitts. “This is not really your area. You are a field agent. You long to be back outside, running through streets and breaking into aban-doned buildings. In England.”

Lucas listened attentively, aware that hope was rising again inside of him.

“I will tell you what I imagine, Lucas.” Mischa said lazily, glancing back at the screen. “I imagine you and John in London together, perhaps in one of our safe houses. John belongs to you, and you belong to me.”

Dizzy, Lucas listened with outward patience, trying not to register John’s movements on the screen out of the corner of his eye.

“But I am not very demanding, you know.” Mischa said reassuringly. “You get a text from me, from time to time, to go and meet a handler in a park, and you get a mission to accomplish. Something to keep you from getting bored. And John is your reward. Your prize. You keep him as long as you deserve prizes.”

Lucas’s mouth was dry. This was the opportunity he’d been waiting for. He was almost afraid to move for fear of reaching out too precipitously and fumbling.

“But my fear is,” Mischa continued, “that John Watson would run away from you as soon as he saw the opportunity.”

Lucas nodded, unaware of how sharp and hungry his face appeared at this moment.

“So I am hesitant to begin these pro-ceedings until I know that he is so much yours that you will not be forced to spend your time chasing after your runaway pet instead of following my directives.”

Lucas nodded again, understanding. Mischa read the situation perfectly, but to Lucas’s relief, seemed to see it more an opportunity to control Lucas from afar than to torture him up close. This was a very positive development.

“I make you a deal, Lucas,” Mischa said finally. “John Watson is yours, now, from this moment. Do with him what you will. Take him to your rooms if you want. Beat him every day if you want. Tattoo your name on him if you want. Break him. Make him as ut-terly yours as you can.”

Lucas felt as though his heart could be heard from outside.

“When this seems to be accomplished, I will handle your out-processing and placement. But be ready to move quickly and de-cisively. When the time comes, I do not want the fanfare of an official release. Lucas North cannot return triumphantly to MI-5. John Watson cannot have a press conference.” Mischa leaned forward and lowered his voice, “I would prefer that even my own superiors not be aware that you are an asset of mine.”

Lucas nodded as if he understood, because … he thought he might. 

A final look at the screen revealed that John was now still—possibly asleep—under the covers. Lucas retreated to his room, intending to do what he’d withheld from doing before: beat off, have a shower and a meal, perhaps a nap… and then dig into John Watson’s phone. He intended to strip the other man bare psychologically, and, he mused as he took his clothes off, John had better enjoy the next four days of respite. He’d settled upon that as time enough for the muscles to recover and for loneliness to set in again.

Then, Lucas was going to move in on him like a storm. No more messing about with waterboards and questions about fucking Yemen. Now, it was going to be personal, and it was going to be sexual, and it was going to be relentless.


	19. Prep

Lucas prowled through his little suite of rooms for the third time, checking to see if all was in readiness. He’d mulled for a time over whether he should reveal to John that he was actually English, and drop the accent, or if he should continue with his Russian persona. 

He finally decided to continue with the persona, at least for now. It seemed to help Lucas to focus, to create a character who could strap an innocent Englishman down and beat him, or probe him, or maybe even simply torment him with light touches. (People didn’t think that was so dreadful, until it had gone on for an hour and their skin was crawling like spiders were on it.) Moreover, he thought that a Russian interrogator was simply more intimidating than a captured British spy.

Accordingly, he procured several books from the prison library in Russian and in English, and put them on his desk. He requested more clothing from Mischa, and a few more outfits arrived quite rapidly. He acquired a fine collection of leather cuffs and straps, and switches and belts via another texted request to Mischa. They arrived in an unassuming brown cardboard box, carried up by a blank-faced guard.

Lucas rigged up his bed to receive John, his heart burning with dark delight as he patiently waited the four days he allotted himself. And most of all, he crawled through John’s phone, studying every email, checking every website, noting every subscription (there weren’t many) and absorbing the details with an interest that rendered paper notes unnecessary.

He studied John’s life as if he were the man’s biographer. Because once he approached John again, he would have a very specific agenda.

 

* * *

 

John, meanwhile, was much less content than Lucas. For a good 48 hours after the last session, the muscles of his buttocks were so sore, he had to sleep face down. He couldn’t even pace. He certainly didn’t want to sit. He ate his meals perched carefully on his side.

And the whole time, his mind was full of Lucas’s voice. It was if the other man was in his brain, speaking to him in that deep baritone, so barely accented, so calm and amused. And the hands. The large, warm, calloused hands… everywhere they touched had nearly screamed in relief. 

And his scent. It lingered in John’s nose.

John felt as though Lucas could see far of him more than any man should. There was a combination of professionalism, detachment, humor, and sternness about his interrogator that made him the natural focus of any unclaimed emotion, and John, alone, afraid, and affection-starved even before his captivity, was vulnerable.

What’s more, John had enough education and training to KNOW he was vulnerable. He was fully aware of what was happening… in theory. He was bonding with his captor. He knew it was happening. He could feel it happening. He just couldn’t stop it from happening. Even in his dreams, Lucas was there, murmuring in his ear.

All John could do was try to remind himself, over and over again, that this was not what he wanted, not really. Then he’d imagine Lucas’s hands on him and his brain would short-circuit, and he’d have to wrap himself up discreetly in his blanket again, and bring Lucas’s sweater to his face while he reached down and tried to find some bit of relief in this cold, ugly place.

 

* * *

 

Lucas reserved Room 1. It was Room 1 because it was usually the first session an inductee experienced: very simple, very brutal, very to the point. It was just a room with deep sink in the corner (they all had that), and a table off to the side where a torturer could put his implements—cane, belt, baton, riding crop, iron bar, whip…

Overhead, a hoist was affixed to the ceiling, and the controls dangled down a few feet away. From the hook on the hoist hung a set of chains ending in leather cuffs.

Oh, and a drain underneath. For the blood and urine and salt water. It was a room for updating a prisoner’s expectations.

When Lucas approached John’s room with the wheelchair this time, he was aware of a sea change in his own mood. He was no longer driven by Mischa’s indoctrination template, no longer under the pressure to maintain any façade about national security, or fictions about the connections and activities of people who didn’t matter in the slightest.

He was a man with keys in his pocket, an official security ID badge that got him everywhere except out the front gates, his own phone and laptop, his own modest suite of rooms (with kitchenette! Oh, what bliss!) and closet full of new clothes and the elegant Rolex… He was very nearly free. All he had to do was follow his heart’s desire and break John Watson.

Now, it was personal, and Lucas was free to explore what he wanted to explore: John. John’s secrets, John’s fears, John’s responses, John’s emotions, John’s limits, John’s priorities, John’s weaknesses, John, John, John.

There was something of the tiger in Lucas’s heart at the moment.

When he opened John’s cell door and pushed in the chair, John didn’t flinch. Looking Lucas in the face, he took a deep breath, stood up calmly, pushing the blanket aside, and said, “Do I need my scrubs?”

“No,” Lucas admitted, his heart swelling with yearning for this neatly knit, resilient little man.

He could see the muscles in John’s face move as he gritted his teeth, but the prisoner didn’t hesitate. He stood, shucked his clothes, and then asked, “Blanket?”

“Of course,” Lucas said politely, grabbing it for him and spreading it on the chair.

John sank into the chair, stared off into space, and let Lucas wrap him up snugly in the blanket’s folds. Then he offered his wrists, unaware of how every cooperative movement made the blood sing through his torturer’s veins.

When he was snugly strapped in, Lucas ran his hand through John’s not-very-clean hair. “Your hair is getting long,” he commented.

“Yeah. I need it cut,” John said dreamily.

Lucas dug his fingers in, grabbed a thick handful, and pulled John’s head back to make him look up at his interrogator. “No, I think I like it longer.”

“I bet you do,” John breathed, and suddenly the heat in Lucas’s gut flared up to dangerous levels.

He kept hold of John’s hair and hunkered down to stare into his face, letting a hint of the tiger show on his own.

“You are a tease, aren’t you, John,” he whispered suddenly. He put his other hand on John’s throat and squeezed slightly. “We will get to the bottom of you,” he promised darkly. He held him that way for a moment, noting how the pupil’s of John’s eyes widened slightly.

Then he released John (with an effort) and stood up to wheel him out of the cell.


	20. Lucas Off the Leash

When John saw the room, he didn’t panic. His eyes moved as he checked out every corner of it, seeing the cuffs, the table, the lack of any frightening or mysterious apparatus. And there was nothing. Even the table was bare except for one long, thick, brown leather strap.

Lucas had chosen it, as he chose all things, deliberately. He didn’t want anything that could hurt the bones. He didn’t like sharp things that cut the skin. A good old-fashioned strap that left red welts and stung like a bee would do just fine. It was something he didn’t need to practice with. Even the length, he chose. He didn’t want wrap-around. He didn’t want to stand too far away. His intentions were very specific.

He was already intent that the session would last less than a half hour. John’s hands would be above his head, and Lucas knew from personal experience how miserable that was. Of course, a true torturer wouldn’t care, but he knew that he had mentally moved from Interrogator to Dom the moment Mischa said he could. He had proven himself Turnable to Mischa. Not by pretending to agree with the goals of Mother Russia (whatever they might currently be) but by demonstrating that if he could have his own living, breathing little corner of England, he was willing to occasionally poke a hole somewhere in another part of the country. 

“Let us talk before your hands are up over your head,” Lucas said considerately, leaving John strapped in the wheelchair and going to lean back against the table, arms folded over his chest.

John looked at the long legs in their black slacks, the well-developed muscles in the other man’s chest. 

“First, I want to tell you that there are very specific parameters to today’s session. I will warm you up with the strap before I even begin asking questions.”

John looked down, and felt his heart rate speed up.

Lucas continued imperturbably. “I do this for your own good, John. I do not want you mistaking my small kindnesses for weakness, and believing that eventually you can prevail upon me to let you have the upper hand. This cannot be. Only one of us can be in control, and that must always be me.”

John said nothing, feeling prickles of awakening sweat all over his body.

“But I also do it because I do not want you to be afraid, and once you have experienced the worst of it, and you know you have, there is much less fear. You are free to make decisions, knowing exactly what the consequences will be. I want this, John. I want you making decisions knowing exactly what will happen next. No uncertainty.”

John looked up at him, puzzled. “I don’t quite understand what you want.”

Lucas gave him a stony stare that covered the contented humming in his chest.

“That is because you have not let me finish.” He said sternly. John’s mouth clamped shut. “I want you to confess the details of your personal life to me. Be aware that I have sifted through every email you have sent and received, every text, perused every website.”

John looked uncomfortable, though there was nothing particularly shocking or deviant about his online presence. 

“My point is, John, unlike previous sessions, I will be asking you questions to which I know you know the answer. Responses such as I don’t know or I don’t remember will not be accepted. I know you know the answer to every question I will ask. And I know the correct answers to most of them.”

“Then why are you asking them?” John wondered testily.

Lucas smiled. “To teach you to be honest with me. This is not about gathering information. This is about you giving me whatever I want from you.”

“I see.” John said stoically. But inside, tumult was rising. Lucas was going to win this battle, John knew already. He himself was ready to surrender before it began, but even that was not allowed. He would have to endure the process exactly as Lucas dictated, being able to see his own defeat from where he sat.

“Yes, you see,” Lucas commented amusedly. “Good. In deference to any lingering pains you have from our previous encounter, I will restrict my strokes to your upper back. Do you have any questions before I unbuckle you from your seat?”

John shook his head, face serious.

Lucas came forward and released John’s ankles, then waist and chest, then wrists. He peeled the blanket off and helped John to his feet, guiding him with gentle, protective touches to stand beneath the hoist. The hook hung low, and the cuffs were at chest level.

He stood very close to John as he strapped the smaller man’s wrists tightly into the cuffs. Lucas leaned over him, bringing their heads together till they nearly touched. John got a good, long sniff of Lucas’s cologne, and to his dismay, his body began reacting immediately. Once his captive’s hands were bound, Lucas ran his own hands over John’s naked sides, and then looked down at the erection that was bobbing up shamelessly between them.

“Ah,” was all he said, but John turned his face away in mortification.

Lucas stepped behind him, able now to let the smile spread over his features. He took the control button in his hands and raised the hoist. He and John both listened to the tick-tick-tick in the quiet, echoing room as each oiled link of the chain slipped over a notch on the gear overhead, and John’s hands were slowly drawn up.

When John’s arms were stretched up tautly, and his heels had risen off the floor, Lucas came around to the front again, standing before him, running his fingers over the scar on his shoulder. Then he was kneeling down so that his face was level with John’s cock, placing his hot hands on John’s hips, framing it. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you here,” he murmured. “I just want to look at it.”

John bit his lips and hung, panting, while Lucas inspected him.

“Look at me,” Lucas demanded abruptly.

John looked down helplessly.

“Look at me, looking at you,” Lucas said with a little smile, his eyes running over every private inch of John.

John could almost feel the black-haired man’s breath on the sensitized head of his cock. He wanted to feel it. His back arched toward Lucas involuntarily, drawing a pleased nod. To John’s almost searing disappointment, Lucas stood and came around to his side. Unexpectedly, he placed his hands on John’s  
buttocks and pried them apart. Far apart, spreading him without gentleness. John lost his balance and fell against the taller man, feeling the smooth slide of his clothes over the heat of his body.

John gave a smothered “Mmp” of protest but kept biting his lips and enduring.

“You know why I do this, John? You think it’s to humiliate you, but no. I want you to know that I have now seen every inch of you, and there is nothing left to hide. You understand? I have seen you, all of you, and accepted all of you. I know your naked body well.”

John shook his head, “Why.. why are you doing this?” He asked raggedly.

Lucas released his hold on John’s haunches and smiled down at him. “Reasons, John. Reasons.”

Then he went to the table and picked up the strap. “We begin now.”


	21. Absolute Honesty

“I start very gently, John. Nothing to fear,” Lucas said, and standing approximately four feet behind the bound man, and somewhat to the left, and let the first stroke fall. John gasped and arched his back as the strap bit him across the shoulder blades. It stung fiercely, but the pain faded after about five seconds. His entire body felt awakened and for some reason, his erection stiffened with it.

“Good, eh?” Lucas murmured, and let another blow fall, watching John tense and twist. Then he waited for the sting to fade before applying the third stroke. John let out a choked sound and squirmed, and Lucas watched his muscles work appreciatively. It was beautiful. He was happy. 

Once he’d established the rhythm, Lucas began the serious business of beating John’s back with the strap. His blows fell very evenly, for he knew that one must use a certain amount of force or the strap would twist, or land awkwardly. One cannot really tap lightly with a leather strap; unless it is very stiff, it won’t hold its swing.

A solid implement offers more control, really. But it can also do so much more damage. A strap must be swung, it must have momentum, or it won’t land with that flat, stinging smack that is so satisfying. 

Lucas drew his arm back only as far as he needed to and swung quickly, landing every blow with a flat, even crack, admiring how John’s body arched in silent protest with each stroke. He was using great restraint, but a leather strap hurts, simple as that. He made sure to land every blow in a slightly different place, carefully working his way around John’s shoulders, upper back and middle back, reddening the area evenly.

John’s legs jerked and his feet scrambled about on the smooth concrete floor, trying to escape the steady licks of the strap, but of course he could not.

Lucas continued until they were both winded, and John was sweating freely. This time, Lucas let the sweat roll down.

He came around to see how John’s erection had reacted to the flogging, and was pleased to see it as alert as before. There was an undeniably erotic component to whipping a naked man, even on the upper back.

“Now, John.” Lucas said, breathing in deep. “Now you tell me all about Mary Morstan. How you met. Where she lives. Everything.”

Lucas questioned John thoroughly, and when John did not want to answer (and he often didn’t) Lucas went behind him without another word and simply flogged him till he cried out the correct answer.

John learned very quickly that Lucas did indeed know the correct answers to his questions, and trying to give fake addresses, or incorrect dates, resulted in a furious flurry of painful stripes. And when he got his interrogator truly annoyed, Lucas spread his feet, drew back as far as he could, and brought the strap down with a crack that made his victim cry out hoarsely and convulse, jerking the chain from the hoist at a desperate angle.

“Don’t lie to me John. Not ever,” Lucas called warningly from behind him. “What kind of car did she drive?”

Within 20 minutes of their beginning, Lucas was able to let the strap dangle down at his side. John was answering every question with chastened honesty, and without hesitation.

“1203, is that her birthday?”

“Yes… Yes, March 12…”

“Are you sure it isn’t December 3, like the Americans would put it?” Lucas asked warningly.

“No, no, it’s March, I swear. I swear. I sent her flowers, you can see in my paypal account where I ordered them.” John gasped out.

“Good John. Very good,” Lucas said, satisfied. He bombarded John with questions for another few minutes and then threw the strap on the table.

John’s back was burning red, but there was no blood. Lucas came up and inspected it without touching, knowing his hands would only add to the pain. 

Finally, he took the controls of the hoist and lowered John’s hands.

John leaned against him unsteadily, breathing heavily. Lucas gladly let him, releasing his wrists from the cuffs and leading him to the wheelchair.

Even with the blanket, John didn’t want to sit back. He perched, bent over, his face in his hands.

Lucas took the towel he’d brought from the pocket in the back of the wheelchair, went to the deep sink, and soaked it in cold water. He wrang it out quickly, and then he returned and draped it over John’s burning back.

John gave a gasp at first, but it turned into a sigh. 

Lucas came around and tucked the blanket over John’s hips and legs as best he could, not wanting his subject to go into shock.

He squatted at John’s side, waiting patiently until the towel quieted the stinging enough for John to sit up. When John seemed to have come back from far away, Lucas looked him in the face.

“Now, John, you have a choice to make.” He announced, and his heart was speeding beneath his elegant black shirt.

John looked at him, eyes bleary. But not afraid, not resentful. Just searching.

“What,” he managed.

“About your future,” Lucas told him calmly.

John waited, eyes roving Lucas’s sharp, intense face.

“When we leave here, I will either take you to my rooms, where you will remain for the duration of your time here, or I will return you to your cell, and you will not see me again. Your case will be handled by someone else.” Lucas said, and his heart thudded at the risk he was taking.

Oh, it wasn’t quite the risk it seemed, because it wasn’t true. If John chose to return to his cell, Lucas would engineer a way to have John returned into his hands, and he would try again. But he hoped desperately that it wouldn’t be necessary.

John’s honest, tired eyes were searching Lucas’s deep, mysterious ones. “Your rooms?” He ventured.

Lucas let his eyes run over John’s face, not bothering anymore to disguise his feelings. “I will be your protector. You will do as I say. I think you understand the implications.”

John’s mouth opened in astonishment, and he seemed unable to speak. In truth, his head was swimming.

“But this is up to you. Your choice. I will not force you. If you choose to return to your cell, I will take you there and leave you be,” Lucas said. Then, unable to resist it, he added, “But I would rather take you to my rooms.”

Then he stared into John’s eyes and waited.

John stared back as if hypnotized for a long moment. Then he blinked rapidly, looked away, and took a deep breath, and said, “I’ll… I’ll go to your rooms with you.”

Lucas wanted to fly into the air and let out a war cry of victory, but he managed to merely straighten his legs, and stand at John’s side for a moment with his hand caressing John’s sweaty hair. 

“Good,” he finally managed to say coolly, and grabbed the handles of the wheelchair to guide it out of Room One.


	22. In Lucas's Rooms

Lucas had to fight the urge to race down the passageway with John’s chair like a child tearing through the grocery store pushing a shopping cart and then stepping up to ride it into the cereal box display. He managed to wheel John to the elevator and up to his floor in a decorous manner.

When the elevator doors opened, John looked around alertly, still leaning forward slightly, protecting his back. For his comfort, Lucas had not applied the torso straps.

The passageway to Lucas’s rooms was different than the ugly white paint and green linoleum of the detention facility below. The walls were painted a subtle gray, and the carpet was that flat, nubby type of indeterminate color one finds in office buildings. Lucas brought the chair to his door and used his keys to open it, very much like a man coming home to his apartment.

He wheeled John inside. The interior was very much like the passageways, rather bland, with square, modern furniture that had little individuality but was unobtrusively sufficient. Like a businessman’s hotel room. It smelled clean. There were blinds rather than curtains. Nothing decorative but nothing glaringly ugly. The gray paint was fresh and unmarked. No pictures on the walls.

John’s eyes followed Lucas around the room as he emptied his pockets and placed everything into metal box on his desk. There was a combination lock on the latch, which Lucas carefully closed.

John stared at the box. His own phone was in there, he knew it. He looked up to see Lucas still staring at him. “I changed the password,” Lucas added.

John nodded, taking in how Lucas seemed right in this room. He, too, was spare, businesslike, simply dressed but with a stark glamor in his tall, thin build and violent black and white coloring. And the blue eyes. And the thin, red lips.

He came to John now and unstrapped him. “Would you like a shower? I recommend cool water for your back.”

“Oh God, yes,” John sighed, and let Lucas guide him with his ever touching hands into the bathroom. Then, to his surprise, Lucas backed out and left him in there alone, giving him one last inscrutable stare before he closed the door.

Not since Afghanistan had John been so grateful for a shower. Lucas was right; his back could only withstand cold water. But for his front, he cranked it to steaming and lathered his hair and pits and privates with abandon. His cock was still stiff and John soaped up his hand and had a good, fast wank. He came so fast and so hard he had to hold the wall to keep his balance. 

When he was finally recovered, and calm, and clean, John turned the water to cold (and low pressure) and let it soothe his burning back. 

When he finally exited the shower, his spirits were positively high. He was undoubtedly going to learn how to be a good prison bitch, he thought wryly, but showers like that were worth it. 

Then he sighed to think that he should ever be so grateful for such a small thing. 

He wiped the steam from the mirror and, finding a small hand-mirror on the back of the commode, he turned to inspect his back. Jesus, it was red. Welts raised, criss-crossed… no question Lucas had really flogged him properly.

Something turned low in his gut, not disgust or hatred, but something more… excited. Either he was a fucked up individual, or Lucas had fucked him up, John thought. He put the small mirror back and avoided his own eyes in the larger one as he shaved, and combed his hair, and made himself look as much like the respectable John Watson he wanted to be as he could.

Then, finally, aware that he was stalling, John exited the steaming bathroom with a towel around his hips.

Lucas was in the kitchenette, heating up something from the cafeteria in a pot. There was no microwave. He glanced over at John. “I put some pajama pants for you on the bed. I did not think you would want a shirt.” He watched John’s red, marked up back as it retreated to the bedroom, and his eyes gleamed with satisfaction and anticipation all in one.

When John returned, Lucas sat him down at fed him some casserole, which he ate thankfully, leaning forward in his chair so that his skin didn’t touch the back. Then Lucas offered him a glass of water and a pill. 

“Take it,” he ordered.

“What is it?” John asked uneasily.

“It’s what I am telling you to take,” Lucas said shortly. “You do as I say.”

John took it reluctantly. Lucas watched him swallow it and then said, “Go lay down on the bed, face down.”

Slowly, John did as he was directed, certain that he was about to be sexually assaulted. But Lucas joined him a few moments later with four bags of rice in his hands from the freezer, and a thin kitchen towel over his arm.

Without comment, he sat on the bed next to his _porosnok,_ laid the towel gently across John’s aching back, and then carefully positioned the chilly rice bags on top of it. Then he placed his own warm hand low on John’s back, where he had not beaten him. He moved his hand about caressingly, and beneath the beautiful relief of the cold bags and the hot hand, John melted. 

“Thank you,” he mumbled, and reached his own hand tentatively to touch Lucas’s thigh. Lucas covered John’s hand with his own free hand, and smiled down at him slightly.

“You take a nap now. The pill will help.” He directed, and sat next to John, stroking his lower back and occasionally turning over the bags of rice until John drifted off to sleep. Even then he hovered for a bit, staring down. To make another human utterly his, happy to be his, grateful to be his… already his own torture at Oleg’s hands was become something different. It was something to be sorted through, combed for information and evaluated in terms of that which was effective and that which had been counter-productive. Rather than push the memories down and let them haunt his dreams, he was now deliberately bringing them up, analyzing them, becoming desensitized to them. He could distance himself from the damage Oleg had inflicted as he shifted from the victim to the perpetrator. Dominating John would heal Lucas.

But he was still determined to do it well, to do it with restraint, to not be brutal or sloppy. He didn’t want John to turn into who Lucas was now. He just wanted him broken to Lucas’s hand, and no one else’s, and nothing more.

When John was deep in his drugged sleep, Lucas carefully removed the rice bags, as too much cold would slow the healing and even damage the skin. 

Then, from the bathroom he took the aloe he’d obtained from the commissary, came back and sat at John’s side again. With the lightest of touches, he carefully applied the aloe to the welts on John’s back. Much as the sight of the torture he’d inflicted was fascinating and compelling to him, he was eager for John to be back to normal. Because when it was time to begin asserting his right to sexual dominance, he didn’t want John distracted by pain.

When Lucas had done everything he could for John’s comfort, he went down to the cafeteria, wolfed down some food for himself, and brought up the leftovers to put in the fridge. It was late afternoon now, and Lucas began brooding about nightfall. It was a large bed, and he intended to sleep in it with John, eventually. But he wondered about what he should reveal, and when. 

The tattoos were what he was worried about. Once he and John became intimate, he didn’t see any way of covering them, and they were clearly prison tattoos. His image as a well-educated Russian of gentlemanly class would … take a hit.

But perhaps they would add to the intimidation factor, particularly if John thought he was a murderer.

And he had killed in the line of duty before he was taken. More than once.

Lucas decided that he would let them be discovered later. Make John peel him like an onion. So for tonight, he would sleep in pajama pants and a long-sleeved cotton shirt. The black band on his wrist might show at some point, but nothing else. And if John awoke in the night to find Lucas sleeping so chastely covered, it might not seem so threatening. Waking up to a naked, heavily tattooed torturer in your room would be… startling.

Having made up his mind, Lucas decided to go for a jog and use the exercise equipment his new security badge allowed him into. John should sleep well into the night, and Lucas needed to keep himself busy or he’d end up pulling John’s pants down and jacking off onto his naked buttocks while he slept.

And that would be undignified. 

He took a plastic bag and tossed some of his old scrubs into it. He didn’t have work-out gear, but these would do. Then he opened the combination lock and withdrew his keys and phone. With one last look at his sleeping prize, Lucas slipped quietly out the door and went to keep himself busy, and hopefully expend enough energy that he could lie down beside John in a few hours and go to sleep without molesting him.


	23. Sergei

Lucas had logged several miles uphill on the treadmill, and was enjoying having the small gym to himself. He gazed down from the huge, seventh floor window at the river and the blues of the estuary in the oncoming twilight. Suddenly, in the reflection of the window, he saw Mischa enter the gym behind him. It was strange to see the heavy-set Russian in sweats with a towel about his neck. He gave Lucas a genial wave of greeting and came to walk gently on the treadmill next to his own. They stared out the window together.

“So, how is your prize?” Mischa asked affably.

“Good. Sleeping. I think I wore him out this morning.”

Mischa chuckled. “Room One was always my favorite. The other pro-cedures, I don’t know. They lack elegance.”

Lucas felt himself suddenly sweating more. He gave Mischa an uneasy glance. Clearly the handler was keeping a close eye on his protégé.

“Have you taken John for another walk on the estuary?” Mischa asked, as if merely making polite conversation. Lucas slowed his treadmill and lowered it, so he could walk companionably with his handler, and answer without panting.

“Not yet. I’d like to…?”

Mischa gestured expressively. “Do it, do it. I do not think of you as a prisoner now, Lucas. I think of you as a member of my team. A very ex-clusive team that I am building, and you are a valued member.” He pointed down to the dunes at the southern-most tip, where the road to the gate dipped close. “One day you should take John there. The view is very… liberating. When you go there, you feel… liberated.”

Lucas agreed cautiously. “Yeah… Oleg took me there.”

Mischa nodded. “And I took Oleg there, long ago.”

Lucas hit STOP on his treadmill, his mind suddenly reeling. “Did you.” He said.

Mischa finally looked at him. “Why do you think I approve of your techniques? I feel like… a grandfather to you.” He gave a slight smirk with his thick lips.

Lucas just stared at him. Mischa gazed back, seeing what was—to him—a very young man with dark hair falling in his hungry, lost blue eyes.

Mischa kept walking on his treadmill, and wagged a finger at him. “But Sergie and Anton, no. They were not mine. And I think you can tell. No finesse, you said. You are correct. Anton is a psy-cho-path and Sergei is a sadist and between you and me, an idiot. I have to tell him exactly what to ask, what to look for… he does no research..”

Mischa turned his attention back to the estuary. “One day Sergei will be gone and I for one will be relieved. He was the protégé of my predecessor who is still a force in this administration, so—“ he shrugged. “He remains. But one day, his temper and his foolishness will get him removed one way or a-nother and I think neither you nor I will be sorry.”

Lucas toweled his face, feeling certain he’d just been given some sort of preliminary context. Knowing Mischa, this was merely frontloading. It wasn’t a direct marching order. It was… setting the stage.

“I like knowing your views on that,” he finally said, feeling that it was the safest acknowledgment he could give.

Mischa hit STOP on his treadmill and turned to Lucas. “I consider you a true pro-fessional, Lucas. There is a reason you are still alive after eight years as our guest, and it is not because you are strong, although you are. It is because I have been watching over you from the beginning. I want you to know that.”

Then, without waiting for a reply, Mischa patted him on the arm and left the gym.

Lucas waited until he was certain Mischa was gone. His stomach was unsettled now, but in a good way. He could hear in Mischa’s casual observations the foundations of an event that might very well constitute his launching back to the West. He felt as though a countdown had begun, and he could hear the ticking.

When he knew he’d have the elevator to himself, Lucas headed back down to shower in his own rooms. The gym shower was too much like the communal prison shower he’d endured for so many years. It was much cleaner and more attractive, but he never again wanted to be afraid to close his eyes in order to rinse his hair.

He slipped into his rooms as silently as he’d left, peeking in to see John still dozing on the bed. He hadn’t moved other than to turn his head. Lucas showered thoroughly, and shaved again, and changed into the soft, concealing sleepwear he’d settled upon. Then he quietly powered up the laptop and sat at the kitchen table to entertain himself until bedtime. There was no television in his rooms, nor any liquor. So it was not completely like freedom.  
But it was the closest he’d been in years, and he was determined not to lose one single inch he’d gained.


	24. First Night

When Lucas had finally tired enough to sleep, he went into the bedroom and stared down at John. Still out like a light. He turned on a lamp to check the wounded skin on his back. Much of the redness had receded, and the welts were not as swollen and puffy. Some bruising had begun. 

He considered how the night was likely to go. He’d given John a sedative that, unfortunately, would probably wear off around 2am. Now, either John would wake up then, or he’d sleep naturally till a more normal hour of the morning. Lucas considered what he wanted John to see and feel and think if he awoke at 2am.

He didn’t want John to be disoriented or uneasy, he knew that. He didn’t want his prize to be confused or frightened. Lucas decided to turn on the standing lamp at the other end of the room. It had a three-way bulb, so he turned it on to the lowest setting, and turned off the one by the bed. He then went back and turned off all the lights in the living area except the one in the kitchenette.

There. This was a safe and non-threatening scenario to wake up to in the middle of the night. It is not too dark to see. You are in a comfortable room, there is low lighting, you can see into the next room… he even went and turned on the nightlight in the bathroom before coming to lay down carefully on top of the covers next to John.

Having been a prisoner for so long himself, Lucas knew that the two things that were most obnoxious were bright lights… and total darkness. One exhausted and the other terrified. But low, gentle lights and open doors, the hum of the refrigerator... God, how he’d missed humming refrigerators! He smiled to himself. Ambient noise.

Tomorrow, maybe he would see if he could procure a fan. This was another soothing sound one did not hear in prison. Prison was a land of echoes and clanging metal, guttural voices, and water dripping. 

Lucas arranged himself comfortably on his pillow and turned his head to look at John. His face looked settled and closed off in sleep, and there were bags under his eyes, but that impish nose and the fine, dark blond hair was eternally youthful and soft. Slight furrowing between the eyebrows. Lucas let his gaze wander up the square jawline to the pink shell of his ear. So neatly put together. So complete within himself. A solidly upper-middle class Brit who had obediently and methodically completed uni, become a doctor, served his country, now tried to serve the world…

He was a living relic of that stolid, imperial English tendency to blindly go where angels feared to tread, be it to conquer foreign lands, or to make up for it by shouldering civilized humanity’s burden. Lucas rolled his head back and let random poetry drift through his head. 

_When you’re wounded and left on Afghanistan’s plains,_  
_and the women come out to cut up what remains,_  
_just roll on your rifle and blow out your brains,_  
_and go to your God like a soldier._

 

Tears pricked unexpectedly at his eyes, and Lucas gave a quiet gasp and blinked rapidly, nearly panicking. No, no, no, no, no… he was going to get himself out, and he was going to get John out, and John would be his, and he would be healed, God Damn it. He fucking would make it happen no matter what he had to do. He bit his lips till he was under control.

_Take Jane Austen’s advice from Persuasion,_ he told himself drily after a moment: _less poetry, more prose._ Soon he and John would be awake and facing each other in the privacy of his rooms, and he needed to find that perfect balance of seducer and terrorist… better than Lovelace, better than Dracula… because they both lost…

Eventually, Lucas was able to drift off to sleep, listening to John breathing on his left, and the refrigerator humming on his right.

 

* * *

 

Around 3am, John awoke with a sudden snap of his eyelids. He was lying on his front, his hands up by his shoulders. It was night. The facility was quiet. Lucas was sleeping at his side. They were both on top of the covers. 

John’s attention was immediately drawn to the man mere inches from him. His vibrant blue eyes were hidden, moving behind the thin white lids. His brows were long, curving frames pointing down to that lethal saber of a nose. His lips were parted and he was breathing deeply. Clearly dreaming. 

Lucas was chastely dressed in a long-sleeved, deep red cotton crew-necked shirt and a pair of soft gray sweats. John had never seen him in anything but sleek black, and his blinking eyes took it all in with wonderment. Here was his interrogator, quietly asleep at his side in soft, casual cotton clothing, one hand across his middle, the other lying limply, palm down, fingers curled.

John stared at him. Here was the man who had become the most powerful being in his world, the mysterious, the inquisitive, the strict and unyielding, the drily funny, the erudite, the menacing, the remote, the tender, the protective, the demanding, the controlling… Lucas. Asleep at his side, still smelling wonderful, his hair all off his face for once, falling back away from his wide, square forehead.

John lifted himself up slightly, dazed, and looked around for a clock. Finally he saw that Lucas’s beautiful blue and silver Submariner watch was on the table beside John. He reached for it and squinted in the dim light. Three in the morning. My God.

He rolled carefully onto his back, needing a new position, and was relieved when it wasn’t too painful. He could feel it, but it was bearable.

Beside him, Lucas stirred and came awake with a soft, indrawn breath. He opened his eyes a bit and looked at John, still holding the Rolex.

Lucas turned on his side and put his hand on John’s chest. “Trying to steal my watch,” he murmured sleepily.

“Had to try,” John breathed back with a slight smile, replacing the watch and bringing his hand up to touch Lucas’s.

“Mine,” Lucas breathed, spreading his hand possessively on John’s breast.

“I know,” John sighed, thinking Lucas meant the watch.

They both fell gently back to sleep, touching hands.


	25. First Morning

When John awoke again, he was alone in the bed and it was light out, but the sky was gray. He could smell coffee. God, to wake up and smell coffee! Amazing the little things you never knew you’d miss…

He sat up carefully, flexing his shoulders and assessing his back. Stiff. Bruised feeling. Sore, but not hot. He stood and wandered from the bedroom, through the sitting area, toward the bathroom. He saw Lucas in the kitchenette, messing about with the coffee pot, still in the red shirt and gray sweats.

John went into the bathroom and relieved himself, and then washed his hands and face, waking himself up. He wondered if he could get a shirt from Lucas. Now that his back was not on fire, he would rather be dressed than half-naked. He still didn’t like looking at his scarred shoulder.

When he came out, Lucas was seated at the kitchen table. He had his laptop open, and a cup of coffee. A second one waited for John.

“I don’t know how you like it,” Lucas said, pointing toward the sugar and milk on the worktop.

John, still feeling drifty, went a put a goodly dollop of milk in his coffee, which Lucas made note of, and then came to sit at the table. He took a few well-bred sips of the coffee and then abandoned pretense and sucked down most of the cup. Lucas smiled, thinking that the one thing Russians did well was coffee. You’d think they were Turks when it came to coffee.

Finally, John made eye contact. “Would you let me borrow a shirt?” He asked.

“Good Morning to you too,” Lucas said drily, rising to refill their cups.

Slightly abashed, John leaned back and then winced when his skin met the chair.

“I’m sorry, good morning,” he said politely to the man who had strung him up by the wrists, naked, and flogged him with a leather strap until his back was a welted mess.

Lucas brought back the two fresh cups of coffee, John’s with milk. He sat again, and reminded himself to keep up the faint touch of Russian accent to his voice when he spoke again. “I would like to apply a topical solution to your back first, to help with healing.”

“No, that’s alright,” John began.

Instantly, Lucas was intent. “I said I would like—do not tell me No!” He interrupted himself to say, staring John down.

John sat up straighter, eyes widened. “I’m sorry,” he said instantly. Immediately a strange warmth began in his stomach. Just a faint tickle.

They eyed each other for a long moment. When Lucas finally relaxed a bit, turning back to his laptop, John exhaled too, and drank more of his coffee. He was going to have to learn a new way of being, clearly.

Lucas finished his coffee, staring down sternly at the laptop, not seeing a thing. Then he closed it with a snap and went and got the aloe. He came to John with it and, clearly trying to conquer his brief flash of temper, asked him politely where he’d like to be while the lotion was applied.

“Um… sofa?” John asked, and Lucas led the way.

John sat primly on the sofa and turned his back to Lucas, who snorted.

“No, I don’t think so,” he said, and sat down, putting a pillow on the cushion to the immediate left of his thigh. “Lay down across my knees and put your head here.”

John hesitated, and Lucas looked at him. “Is how I want you,” he said firmly.

There was another wavering moment before Lucas said, “John, if you do not do exactly as I bid at all times I am going to keep you cuffed, collared, and tied to my bed. Maybe this is what you are hoping for?”

John gave an astounded look first at Lucas, and then at the studio audience in his head, and finally lay down, his torso on his captor’s lap, and his head on the pillow. He didn’t know what to do with the arm that dangled loose over Lucas’s legs, and finally let it curve gingerly around his interrogator’s calf.

After a moment, Lucas chuckled. “Now I am sad because I have no excuse to tie you down.” He squirted a few drops of the aloe onto his hand and began applying it to John’s back with the gentlest of touches.

The room fell silent as Lucas worked the lotion into John’s flesh with exquisitely slow strokes, covering only a few square inches at a time. He was enjoying this, falling into a state of focus that didn’t even seem to require him to breathe. 

John lay on the warm, hard lap, his hand gradually molding itself more boldly to Lucas’s calf, and the nerves on his back singing choral medleys to the direction of the fingers that stroked them. His skin was exquisitely sensitized, the welts still raw and tingling, the bruises tender and aching. Unconsciously, John fell into a sort of trance not unlike the one he fell into when Lucas strapped him into the wheelchair.

His head was heavy on the pillow, and soon John was rotating his hips so that they were aligned more with his back. He pulled both feet up onto the sofa and straightened his legs out so he was completely prone. He turned his face on the pillow toward Lucas. 

Both men were quiet, their breathing gradually becoming synchronized to each other’s, though neither was aware. Lucas began pushing his fingers deeply into the muscles between the welts and bruises, sliding them carefully around the sensitive areas. John flattened under his hand like a pizza crust being slowly rolled out. His eyes closed and his mouth opened. 

Lucas put the aloe down so he could sink his other hand into John’s hair and toy with it absently. He looked possessively down at the limp body compliant under his hands.

Eventually, Lucas’s hand wandered down to the lower back, where no damage impeded the slow massage of his fingers. He dug in slightly, testing John’s response, pleased when he seemed to grow even heavier and more relaxed. Gradually it was his whole warm hand caressing John’s lower back with firm, slow circles, carefully pinching the flesh between his finger and thumb and loosening, and then working it again.

John stretched out further, in absolute bliss. The warmth in his stomach unfurled and spread further down. The warm palm kept moving in slow, squeezing, hypnotic sweeps. 

Without thinking it over, John suddenly sat up, interrupting the massage, and moved to straddle Lucas’s lap. His eyes were heavy and distant. Placing his hands on the other man’s shoulders, John sank into him and kissed his neck ardently, and then sucked some of the flesh into his mouth. He spread his knees, and pushed himself in as fully against the other man as he could.

To say that Lucas’s mind was blown was an understatement. Never had it occurred to him that John would make the first move. He sat with his mouth open, all the blood rushing to his groin as John ground against him on his lap and sucked on his neck in slow, drawing pulls. Dizzying want washed over him.

With a groan, he slid his hands up John’s back, and suddenly John pulled off his neck with a painful hiss.

That was all it took for Lucas to remember his plans. Both men froze, staring at each other. Lucas looked more vulnerable and open than John had ever seen him. A moment ticked by.

“Alright,” Lucas said firmly, moving out from under John and heaving himself to his feet. He took a few steps away, running his hand through his hair, and then turned to look at John who still knelt on the couch, looking abandoned and hurt.

He came back to him, cradling the other man’s face in his hand and touching their foreheads together. He got his breathing under control and said shortly, “Let’s let your back heal.”

Then, unable to trust himself a moment longer, Lucas went into the bedroom, closing the door behind him. He emerged two minutes later, having dressed so fast John wondered if there was a phone booth in there, and with his keys in his hand. He snatched up the strong box on the desk and then moved swiftly past John to grab his laptop.

“Places to go, people to whip?” John asked curtly.

Lucas turned to give him what almost looked like a pleading gaze. “Yes. No, I mean--“

He broke off and took a deep breath. “Help yourself to the food. If you get bored, read a book. Don’t leave these rooms.” His accent nearly disappeared, but neither of them noticed.

He strode out the door and closed it behind him.

John stared at the closed door, hating himself for that moment of weakness.

A moment later, the door opened again and Lucas peered in at him, hair falling over his eyes. “Seriously, John. Don’t leave these rooms.”

Then he was gone again.

John went to have a moody wank in the bathroom.


	26. Temptation

Lucas hunkered in the conference room, absently messing around on the laptop. He’d set up a portal to access John’s email and was now picking through the sent messages for the fifth time, absorbing John’s written voice. He was much more eloquent in writing than when speaking. Of course, many of the times they’d spoken, he’d been under duress.

Sighing, Lucas trolled John’s favorite websites, searching for more insights. He could have sworn John was generally straight, and had accepted that drawing a sexual response from him would be a matter of finding his kink and circumventing any normal courtship behavior. But here he was, squirming on Lucas’s lap just from being massaged.

Funny that Lucas should now be looking for ways to slow down the process. At least until the back healed. He couldn’t concentrate the way he needed to with an injured partner, it just wasn’t in his make-up, unless the injury was … well, certain areas enjoy being hurt. He smirked to himself. He should have saved the electricity for last.

“If I’d only known,” he breathed.

The door opened and Mischa entered, dressed in a gray suit of shiny, silvery make. Lucas sat up. Mischa looked more formal than usual. 

“Am I in the way?” Lucas asked, closing his laptop and preparing to vacate.

“Not at all, not at all. Lucas, it is you I come to see.” Mischa said. He looked thoughtful. “But is there trouble in Paradise? I had thought to have to pry you out of your rooms like a turtle from its shell, now you have your very own prize all softened up and in your bed.”

Lucas gave an embarrassed little laugh. “Pacing plan,” he said, not wanting to explain further.

Mischa looked Lucas’s neck for a moment without comment. He was clearly amused. “Your self-restraint is admirable. Perhaps you will not mind to do a small errand with me, then, to get you out-doors and divert your mind.”

The ticking of the clock in Lucas’s gut suddenly became louder. He sat alertly, pushing the laptop aside, his shadowy eyes fastened on the older man’s face.

“Yes.” He said tensely.

“Do you think you could help me deliver a package? You will have to drive… you remember driving, yes?”

Lucas’s heart thumped like a war drum. “I do.”

Mischa nodded. “I show you how to work the GPS. Is a new thing. New for you, I think. Very helpful, when they actually work. Occasionally they lead someone off an incomplete overpass and into a lake, but overall, very handy. Come.”

Lucas retrieved his security badge and phone from the strong box and put them in his pockets with his keys. He then put John’s phone in the box and left the box with his laptop.

“It will be fine there,” Mischa assured him, and they left the conference room, locking it behind them.

Lucas followed Mischa through the facility and to the forbidden zone of the front lobby, his eyes darting about alertly. This was the first time in years he’d walked through a lobby, dressed like a free man in civilian clothes. It was a nice lobby. There were plants. Mischa gave a desultory wave to the guards and then they were through the glass doors and outside.

The air was cool this morning, and Lucas couldn’t help staring up at the sky. There were birds flying overhead and his gaze followed them, even as his feet followed Mischa into the parking lot.

They approached a silver GAZ Volga, and Lucas stopped and gave it an admiring stare.

Mischa smiled indulgently. “Is nice, yes? Several years old now, but still in very good spirits. I am careful with her.”

“It’s yours?” Lucas asked, eyes still riveted on the car.

“Sadly, no, only for work,” Mischa said, sliding into the car on the right side.

Lucas slid in on the left and was startled to find the steering wheel in front of him.

“Ah, I forget you are not one of us. Perhaps we drive around the parking lot for a few moments,” Mischa commented, handing him the keys calmly and then taking his phone out to text someone.

Lucas was so churned up inside, he felt like wind was blowing past his ears. He started the car and just marveled a bit at the feeling of having horsepower under the control of his hands again. He backed the car out carefully and, in hesitant starts and stops, maneuvered it around the parking lot sedately for a few minutes while Mischa tapped on his phone.

At length, the older man looked up. “You are good driver, Lucas. Pull over, I show you the GPS.”

Fifteen minutes later, they were driving through Stavropol. Lucas’s eyes were drinking up the sights. Mischa directed him to pull over by a stunning white church topped with glittering golden domes. “Step out, Lucas. We step out and look. Is beautiful, yes? Oh, is cold. Look in the trunk, there is a coat for you.”

Lucas went to the boot of the car. He opened it to find a dead body curled up—male--plastic distorting its face. It looked very much like the second MI-6 agent. There was a black peacoat folded neatly next to it. He glanced around, took the peacoat, and closed the boot with a slam. Mischa watched him closely, nodding approval.

He turned to the church. “Look here,” Mischa said, pointing to the church. “You see the ridges along the tops of the columns? In English, you call it the architrave. Note that the columns are not fluted… you know, no grooves in them. Smooth. Not really columns, of course, flat against the façade, meant to suggest columns. Is very Greek, yes? Neo-classical I think they say.”

Lucas nodded, putting his hands in the pockets of the coat and glancing around. “But see how the arches above have the point. Not a peak like Gothic, but a point like our onion domes, see?”

Lucas inhaled and nodded. “Greek with Russian influence.”

“Yes, exactly. We take the styles of our predecessors and then we add little bit here, little bit there… make them our own. The gold domes, of course, pure Russia. But underneath, very Greek. But look at the pediment over the entrance. A broken pediment, is open… this was actually something the English made popular. So you see this beautiful church, is rather like you, eh Lucas?”

Mischa patted Lucas on the left breast firmly and Lucas felt the heavy shape of a gun inside the peacoat he was wearing. Now his handler spoke quietly.

“Is loaded. Where we are going, the package we are delivering, there might be trouble. You get me there and back to the facility in safety, yes, Lucas?”

Lucas nodded, still looking up at the church as if he were a tourist and Mischa his guide. Then they got back into the Volga.

Now the GPS took them to a less attractive part of the city, more industrial. Mischa directed him to pull into a massive gray parking garage, and they wound up its levels until they reached one near the top that was nearly empty.

“Park next to that red Fiat.” Mischa pointed, and Lucas complied.

Mischa took the keys from Lucas, popped open the boot and left it ajar but not wide open. Then he handed back the keys and led Lucas up to the roof of the structure. The wind whistled up there, and Lucas turned up the collar to his new coat, and went to the edge to check out the view of the city, as well as any spots for snipers on nearby buildings.

Mischa was calmly texting again. He looked over at Lucas. “We may be here a moment. Here, let me show you the sights.” Mischa came to stand by Lucas and pointed north east. “The airport is that way, maybe 12-13 kilometers.”

Lucas’s heart pounded. He put his hand over the gun and checked behind him. He could shoot Mischa right now. Just shoot him, walk down to the car, drive to the airport and then… what? No money, no passport. Find the British Embassy, beg for help. Yes, he could do that. But John.

Mischa smiled and pointed in another direction. “Do things my way Lucas. You have waited 8 years, you can wait a little longer to obtain the outcome you most desire. See that building over there with the odd top to it? EuroOtel. A good place to remember. But this parking garage, this is an old KGB favorite. We used to call it RusOtel.” He chuckled. “I don’t even know why.”

He checked his phone again.

“Oh, very efficient. I think we can go now.”

They went to the car. The red Fiat was gone. The boot of the car was open. The body was gone. Mischa slammed it shut, they both got into the car, and then Mischa said, “Are you hungry? I’m hungry. Let us go and find the Fish and the Chips that you English so admire. You can tell me if they are au-then-tic.”


	27. Begin the Beginning

Lucas stood outside the door to his rooms. It was late afternoon. Inside was John. Outside the facility was a whole free world, one that he had nearly forgotten existed. Mischa had taken him on a tour of the city that left him feeling like… a new man. But one with raw skin. One who had not been exposed to that kind of air in years and years and years.

Freedom was so close. And yet so far, and it all depended on Mischa being pleased with what he saw of Lucas and John’s relationship. Like the falconer, Mischa had the glove and Lucas wore the jesses, and Mischa seemed convinced that the relationship between Lucas and John was the leash that could control him.

And it probably was. He could have run today, killed Mischa, left John, just RUN. But he didn’t, did he? He was back here, in this facility, a man with keys and a commissary account, a tapped phone and laptop, and some borrowed clothes that covered his blurry, blue-black prison tattoos. Oh, and a beautiful Rolex. Lucas gave a cough of a laugh. A fucking watch, wow.

He was not the man he’d been eight years ago.

This was not freedom. Today had shown him that. But freedom loomed, tantalizing, flavorful… Lucas carried a sizable take-home portion of fish and chips for John in his hand, right this minute. 

But even John couldn’t know how stunning it had been to sit in a pub, even in Stavrapol, with the man who had tortured the man who had tortured you… before you tortured John… and eat fish and chips. For the first time in years, to see young people walk by outside the window, all playing with their phones, literally, all of them… that was new. The newer models of cars. The flat screens everywhere in the pub, showing the latest football match. Argentina and Uruguay. People talking and laughing in that desultory way… Mischa paying with a shiny credit card. A little boy running about the pub with a small, flat iPad in his sticky hand. Lucas stared, realizing that he had not seen a child in eight years.

It was overwhelming.

Lucas leaned forward and gently put his head on the door. He felt as if he were going mad. Hope, that’s what does it. Hope drives you mad. The death of hope is the beginning of patience. Alexandre Dumas? Sir Walter Scott? …Lucas North?

Suddenly, Lucas stood straight and realized that he wanted one person, one person to look at him, know him, see him. That person would best be John. But looming over them both was the shadow of Russia, personified in Mischa, and … dare he?

He didn’t know.

Lucas unlocked the door and entered, looking around for John.

John was stretched on the couch, wearing one of Lucas’s shirts and the pajama bottoms, reading Clarissa. Well, there hadn’t been much to choose from, of the library books.

Lucas entered, shrugging off the peacoat. To his sudden shock, he realized that Mischa had not relieved him of the gun. My God, he had a loaded gun. He stood stupidly for a moment, holding the coat over his arm. It was probably a test. All of today had been a test. John was a test. His whole life was a fucking test.

Lucas said huskily, “Want some fish and chips?”

John stood up instantly. “Uhm… YES??” he smiled.

Lucas felt an easing around his heart. “Here,” he said. “I’ll be right back. I forgot something.”

He gave John the food and retreated, locking the door behind him again. 

When he entered the conference room, Mischa was there with two of the agents who “worked the floor” they would have said back in MI-5. A man and a woman who had cubicles out on the open area near the conference room. Lucas recognized them. One had checked out the laptop to him initially. The other was the woman who had brought him John’s phone. They both looked at him when he entered, giving him a perfunctory nod.

“Oh God, I’m sorry,” Lucas said. “I just need my—“ he pointed at the laptop and strongbox he’d come to retrieve, still sitting on the table, and Mischa sat back in his chair.

“Ah, Lucas. I was just telling my colleagues how helpful you were today.”

Lucas gathered his belongings and gave them all a nod. “Yes, well. This coat?”

Mischa gave an expansive wave. “Keep it, it suits you. Make sure you lock up any sensitive material.”

My God, the gun. Mischa was letting him keep the gun. _Holy fuck.  
_

Lucas nodded and turned away, moving toward the door with all the calm professionalism he could muster. Every step of the way, he listened for Mischa to call him back. It didn’t happen. 

In the elevator, Lucas leaned back against the wall, all his precious symbols of freedom wrapped in his arms. His head felt like the ocean and the tide was coming in.

He re-entered his room, noting that John was sitting at the table, wolfing down the fish and chips. He glanced over at Lucas, looking glad to see him again. Well, yes, alone all day, not even a phone or laptop or television to distract you. How had they lived, 200 years ago? Books? Paper and pens? Clarissa and Lovelace had written 500 letters between them, in the course of a year. Lucas supposed that’s what people did, then.

Lucas put the laptop on the desk and discreetly set the lockbox down, opening it up and placing in it his phone, his badge, and his new gun, a small, black P-96 now that he had a chance to look at it. Yes, loaded. He tucked it away and locked the box.

Then, with a sigh of disbelief, he hung his new coat up in the closet.

He went to regard John. John was finishing the fish and chips, looking fairly content.

“Make some coffee and then I want to look at your back,” Lucas directed, and went into the bathroom.

“What, am I your wife now?” John muttered, and Lucas paused and looked back. 

“Yes,” he said with a pointed look. “Make coffee.”

John found himself tempted to smile. He smothered the urge and made coffee, doing his best to feel put-upon. Fact was, he was glad Lucas was back in the rooms with him. He felt like a dog that had been left alone all day.

The coffee-maker gurgled as he waited for Lucas to re-emerge.

Finally, Lucas did. He looked as though he’d washed his face. John watched the taller man kick off his shoes and place them in the closet, and then he came for coffee. Sitting down at the table, Lucas said, “Bring it to me,” and looked at John meaningfully.

That warm tickle started in John’s stomach again. He had a feeling that Lucas was in the mood to make something happen now. He poured Lucas a cup of coffee obediently. 

“Two sugars,” Lucas said, watching him like a hawk.

John fixed the coffee obligingly and brought it to Lucas.

“May I have some, oh Mighty Lucas?” He asked softly.

Lucas gave a rather ominous smile. “You may, Humble John.”

John shot him a Fuck You look and got himself some coffee.

They sat at the table together, sipping their coffee, both aware of the sudden tension.

Finally, John put his cup down. “Is something wrong?”

Lucas answered instantly. “You’re in a Russian prison, John, I would say that something is probably wrong.”

John gave a chagrined smile, the kind that gets forced out of you. “Right.”

Lucas kept looking at him, as if he were mulling something over in his mind and couldn’t get it straight.

“Have you heard anything about my case?” John asked seriously.

Lucas shook his head as if in disbelief. “Your case. Yes. I forgot you think you have a case.”

John grew still and his eyes searched the sharp angles of Lucas’s face.

“Don’t I?” He asked.

Lucas gave him a rather pitying look. “Not really. No. You are here because you are needed here.”

Then he drank his coffee, as if certain that in a moment, the situation would be beyond coffee at the table.

John stared at him.

Lucas finished his cup and said, “Drink your coffee.”

For lack of anything better to do, John drank his fill and then sat back.

“Good,” Lucas said. “Now I think we go into the bedroom and I look at your back.”


	28. Get Down On It

Lucas closed the door behind him. John’s eyes flicked past him to the door, and back to him.

“Take off everything,” Lucas directed, leaning against the door, his eyes on John. He looked sharp, pale, and a little bit criminal.

John took off the shirt, considered putting up some sort of argument over the pants, and then realized that ultimately, he would lose. Why fight? He slipped the pants off.

Lucas nodded approvingly. “Good. Lay down, let’s see your back.”

John lay down and stretched out. There was no denying that his heart was thrumming. Lucas had waited until John’s back was no longer raw. Now he was done waiting: this was clear.

He felt the other man mount the bed and put a hand flat on his upper back. “Hurt?”

“No,” John breathed, waiting.

Lucas pressed harder. “This?”

“No…”

“And this?”

“Mm. A bit.”

“Alright.” Lucas eased off his back and put his hand on John’s buttock, squeezing tightly. “These recovered?”

“Yeah,” John said, every nerve alert.

“Good.” Lucas went to the corner of the bed, dug down and brought up a leather cuff with a chain attached. “I want you to put your wrist in this cuff now, John.”

John looked at it for a moment and then stretched his arm out docilely. Lucas’s heart clenched and he closed his eyes for a moment with relief and joy. Then he secured John’s wrist.

He went to the other side of the bed. “Other,” he said simply, and John made the offering.

Down at the foot of the bed, Lucas pulled up the other chains. “Ankle. Come, John. I want you spread out like a starfish.”

Lightheaded with fear and excitement, John spread his legs wide and let Lucas secure all four corners of him. Then the other man straightened up.

“That is nice,” he mused, looking down at John, who was stretched out like a medieval sacrifice. “Don’t need pillows,” he commented, and pulled them away, tossing them on the floor. John lay flat, waiting. He was aroused, he was nervous, he felt like he was floating away and sinking down both that the same time.

“You’re mine, you know,” Lucas said, as if stating something utterly mundane. _It’s going to rain again. I need to do laundry. You are mine, you know._

John lay breathing on the mattress. Experimentally, he gave a tug at the restraints. Nope, not budging. Now his erection was stiffening up enough to be uncomfortable, and he had to lift up his hips a bit to give it leeway to place itself. 

Lucas watched, with a satisfied little smirk. Then he reached down and put his fingers on that sensitive skin just behind John’s balls and began stroking lightly. 

John gave a cry and started writhing, trying to escape the fingers. They tickled and teased him, and his single cry turned into an ongoing series of yelps as Lucas continued tormenting that one area between his thighs.

“Ah God, stop, stop!!” John managed, and finally, Lucas stopped with a chuckle.

“Nothing you can do. You understand? You’re mine, and there is nothing I cannot do to you. I can tease you. I can hurt you. I can fuck you. I could kill you. No one will break down that door and save you, you understand, John? You are in a Russian prison now. And I am your keeper, and you are mine.”

John lay panting, listening. Lucas leaned over him. “I’ll tell you something, though, John. I’m definitely not going to kill you. Not ever. But the other three? I think… yes.”

He reached down and began softly teasing that very private area again, watching with enjoyment as John squirmed and twisted his hips, muffling his cries in the mattress. It was very much like tormenting him with electric shock, but this was teasing rather than hurting. Of course, both could be pleasurable. He stroked more firmly, listening to how John’s cries lowered to groans. Smiling, he applied this technique for nearly a full minute while John writhed and dug his face into the sheets.

Lucas decided it was time for the reveal. He straightened up, unbuttoned his shirt and threw it to the side. John turned his head, breathing heavily, and looked. His eyes widened, taking in the tattoos, and the definition of Lucas’s torso. Lucas let him look, spreading his arms as if to see, “See who I am?”

Then he turned his back. He could hear John’s breathing increase. The eight onion dome tattoos covered his back. He didn’t know if John understood fully their purport, but he obviously knew that they were not the markings of some elite fraternity. He turned back, and pulled the belt from his pants, wrapping the buckle end around his fist, letting the flat end dangle down.

“Do you want 20 good ones on your arse now, John?” he asked softly, a little smile playing on his thin lips. Lucas looked positively wolf-like now. “Say you do.”

John stared up at him. “I do,” he gasped, and Lucas nodded approvingly.

“Good… good.” He murmured, and then began the process of smacking ten good licks in measured rhythm on John’s twitching, squirming buttocks, followed by ten much harder ones. John gave full-throated shouts of anguish with every stinging blow. Lucas didn’t want to stop. Watching John straining at the restraints while he tried to fuck the mattress was a fine way to spend an evening.

Lucas stood, breathing heavily, while John moaned and writhed until the stinging subsided.

“Those were good, weren’t they?” Lucas asked, feeling feral.

“Fuck,” John groaned, face down.

“Yeah,” Lucas put the belt down, dropped his trousers, and shucked them off with his socks. “We’re getting to that.”

He sat down on the bed, opened the desk drawer, and pulled out a tube of lubricant and a latex glove. He pulled the glove on and squirted the lube onto his hand.

“So, Dr. Watson. How many times have you stood behind a man putting on a glove like this, hm?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at John.

John panted and watched him, then shook his head slightly. “Not too often,” he managed. He was incredibly turned on and terribly uneasy all at once. Lucas, naked and aroused, was even more intimidating than Lucas fully dressed and holding electric probes. And all the more exciting for it. John gave himself up for lost and just waited to see what the next second would bring.

Lucas turned, displaying a long, thick erection sprouting from a nest of black hair, and then John lost sight of him as he moved to kneel between his captive’s spread legs. John shut his eyes, bracing himself.

Suddenly he felt a digit pushing into his hole. He tried to remain relaxed, letting the incoherent cries from his throat do all the protesting. That was a thumb, he decided, when Lucas inserted it up past the knuckle and began flexing it roughly.

John gave a strangled shout into the mattress, feeling the way Lucas’s fingers gathered up under his balls. The thumb pressed down and the fingers pressed up into the flesh, and John realized to his shock that Lucas was simply squeezing the tissue up near his prostate. Squeezing it hard, and thrusting his hand in between John’s buttocks until the thick pad at the base of his thumb was demanding entrance into John’s anus.

The feeling was amazing, erotic and humiliating and painful and pleasurable all at once. Lucas put a hot hand on John’s sore buttock and pulled it to the side, prying him open to increase the access. John lost control entirely and rutted like a mad thing while Lucas worked his thumb relentlessly inside John. The torment was so close to his prostate, but not quite close enough, although every violent push and twist of Lucas’s hand seem to bring it closer.

And the squeezing, Jesus Christ. Lucas tightened his grip on that flesh and jiggled it roughly, and John just screamed into the sheet.

“Yeah, I thought you’d like that,” Lucas murmured. He kept a brutal grip on that tender flesh and leaned back, settling himself comfortably between John’s trembling legs. Then he took his other hand and started spanking John’s reddened buttocks again. Occasionally he rotated his thick thumb inside John’s hole, working it open without mercy. Then he squeezed again, and slapped the red cheeks briskly.

John was nearly out of his mind. Lucas thrust and jiggled like he was prying open a door, and John’s arse was opening right up. His erection was dripping and his heart was pounding.

“You want me to fuck you now, don’t you,” Lucas said, giving another painfully pleasurable squeeze of the tissue. John could feel his knuckle working him open farther.

John made a strangled sound, unable to form any words, and Lucas pulled out, got to his knees, peeled off the glove and pulled John’s cheeks apart. He slapped some lube on himself roughly, put the head of his cock at the entrance, and started working it in.

“Condom—“ John croaked, and Lucas gave a dark chuckle.

“It’s prison, John. We don’t have condoms. Hope for the best,” he added, and then began pushing himself in.

Bright lights flashed behind John’s lids and he struggled against the restraints to his heart’s content, but they held. Lucas was slowly cracking him apart, and it burned him and thrilled him at the same time. 

The room was full of their guttural cries as John squirmed, and Lucas made the squirms work for him. They were both sweating, both grimacing with concentration and emotion. Lucas straddled John’s hips and braced himself on his captive’s back with one hand, holding his cock with the other and working it in as slowly as he could stand to, nudging and pushing relentlessly. 

John let out cries of pure reaction with every inch of invasion until finally he was completely filled. Lucas, panting above him, kept one hand on John’s upper back and used the other to spread the reddened buttocks. He ground his hips down between them, making sure he was as deep as he could get.

John groaned, eyes closed, mouth wide. He felt full, stretched tight, impaled, and Lucas was like an animal digging and pressing deeper into him as if nothing was ever going to be enough. 

Lucas lay down on him, putting every bit of weight on his captive that he could. He gave John a moment to adjust, contenting himself with biting the back of his neck just hard enough to make John give little grunts of acknowledgement. 

Then, finally, he started thrusting. There was nothing tender about it. This was a fucking, and John felt it. He twisted violently under Lucas, and the other man shoved his ropey arms around John’s torso, and held on tight, still thrusting. It was the most elemental, primitive sensation John had ever experienced. Lucas left off biting to arch up his back, lower his head and plant the top of it between John’s shoulders, and angle his hips differently. That angle did something inside John that made sharp pleasure suddenly shoot through him like electricity.

“Oh Jesus,” he shouted, spreading his legs further to give Lucas greater access.

“Yeah?” Lucas panted behind him, moving quickly and harshly, slamming his hips into John’s arse. “You feel that?”

Now John was lost in sensation, all dignity gone, rutting his buttocks against the thrusting hips above him. Lucas gave a sharp grin and lowered one slippery hand to John’s cock. 

“Oh God yes, please, Jesus, yes—“ John pleaded, and Lucas grabbed on as best he could, but they were both slamming like pistons now, and the bed was hitting the wall with brisk knocks. He squeezed John’s cock and moved in for the kill, gripping John by one shoulder with his other hand, and fucking like he was trying to split his body in half.

John let out a protracted cry, stiffened up and convulsed, coming helplessly into Lucas’s tight grip while Lucas pounded him like a machine until, a moment later, he dug himself as far into John as he could get and ejaculated deep inside him, pushing his hips down hard as if to plant it as far in as it would go. John’s entire body seemed to contract around Lucas’s cock, clamping down on it while he shuddered and strained against the cuffs, face contorted as if in agony.

After several seconds in rigid, involuntary paralysis, they both slowly collapsed in a sweaty heap, gasping like marathon runners. John’s wrists were red from struggling and his hair was dark with sweat. Lucas had his face buried between John’s shoulder blades like he wanted to die there. His hands moved up to clutch John’s arms tightly. He rubbed his face in the sweat and John winced, feeling the whiskers scrape his back.

Finally, Lucas pulled carefully out, making John draw in and give a keening noise until he was free. The larger man rolled over on his back and lay panting up at the ceiling. His eyes drifted over to the light fixture. He considered waving at Mischa but supposed that would be unprofessional.

John lay limp, letting his breath come seeping back. There was silence in the room as they both recovered, letting normality return to their psyches. Becoming civilized again. Getting their manners back. Lucas finally looked over at him. “You want a shower?” He asked huskily.

“Yeah,” John said. What else was there to say? Oh, wait, there was something else. “How come you have latex gloves but no condoms?” He asked, when he could breathe again.

Lucas shrugged. “Cafeteria.”

“Right,” John sighed. Lucas heaved himself up and undid his cuffs. Then he held out his hand to help John up.

“But,” John added, “I don’t know why you bother with gloves if you don’t have condoms.”

“Fingernails, John,” Lucas said shortly, pushing him toward the shower.


	29. Bonding

In the shower together, John inspected Lucas’s tattoos quietly. Lucas let him, turning this way and that under the warm water in response to the gentle touches. He watched John’s face as his eyes roamed over the various markings. He didn’t need help with the Latin or the Greek, but did ask for a translation of the Russian inside his arm. The eight onion domes on his back seemed to disturb John the most. But he refused to ask what they meant, and Lucas didn’t offer an explanation.

When they were dried and had slid on pajamas, there was a sudden knock at the door of the suite. Lucas turned in alarm, staring at it. No one ever came to the door. 

He headed straight for the lock box, and turned the dial quickly, fully intending to answer the door with the gun in his hand. But when he opened the box, he saw his phone was lit up with a text from Mischa.

_Is okay, is only a gift_

 

John watched, a little confused as Lucas lowered the phone and went cautiously to the door. When he opened it, two guards stood before him. One was balancing a box that looked to be a 42 inch flat screened television with built-in Blu-ray, and the other had a box of lately released DVDs.

“Oh my God, it’s Christmas,” John said, behind him, and Lucas stepped back to let the guards come in and set up the television near the windows. 

He returned to his phone to see another text. _Just something to say Well Done._

Wryly, Lucas wondered if Mischa meant “Well done helping me dispose of the body,” or “Well done buggering John Watson into jelly.” There wasn’t much way to ask for clarification, either, without sending the sort of text you really didn’t want in your records. Grinning, he settled for _It was a pleasure._

Immediately, the reply came: _clearly_

Lucas laughed and shook his head at how profoundly fucked up his life was, and how terribly well he’d adapted to it. He looked up to see John watching him closely… almost… jealously?

“Someone made you smile,” John commented, as the guards picked up the box and the plastic the tv had been packed in, and left with curt nods.

Lucas glanced down at the phone again. “It’s… just my boss. He has an unusual sense of humor.”

“What’s he look like,” John asked casually, looking through the box of DVDs.

“Boris Yeltsin,” Lucas said honestly.

John’s shoulders relaxed and he grinned. “Oh.” Then he picked up a DVD. “Inception! I’ve never seen this, have you?”

Lucas hadn’t seen many movies in eight years, so he gestured for John to pop it in, and they settled on the couch together. After a moment, Lucas swung his legs up, turned, and grabbed John’s arm, pulling him into his embrace. “Come. Your rapist wants a cuddle.”

John sank into his arms willingly, but his face was disturbed. “That’s not really a word I like to joke about,” he said.

Lucas stared straight at the television screen, his face impassive. “What, cuddle?”

John sighed. “No. I mean. Look—“ he picked up the remote and hit pause, and sat back up to look Lucas in the eye.

“Oh good. We are going to talk.” Lucas deadpanned.

John gave him a long, steady look. Then he licked his lips and said, “Look, you did give me a choice. You said when you asked me to your rooms… I mean, you made it clear, and I consented.”

“You consented because you knew that if it wasn’t going to be me, it would be the next interrogator.” Lucas said, still staring at the paused image on the screen. Leonardo DiCaprio was lying on a deserted beach with the incoming tide frozen around him in mid splash.

“No,” John said.

“Yes,” Lucas contradicted. He cut his eyes toward John and said coldly. “I know what I am, John. I know exactly what I've become over the years. I wasn't a good man to start with and nothing that's happened in the last eight years has improved me.”

That came out much more rapidly and fluently than Lucas intended. John stared at him.

“You don’t know who I am at all. You don’t know what I am.” Lucas said, and his eyes began to burn. His throat hurt.

John’s eyes were taking him in with great intensity. “I… I wanted you. Okay? I wanted to come up here with you. I thought about it for days.”

“I made you want me.” Lucas said bluntly, “Let’s not sugarcoat it. I broke you down and now here you are. With me.”

“Fine, whatever—“

“No, it’s not fine—“

They were talking over each other now, both agitated.

“I don’t care, I don’t care—“

“You don’t know!”

They both stopped. For a moment they were paused, like the film. Then John sighed and sank into Lucas’s arms. “Alright…. Alright. Fine. Come on, then. Your victim wants a cuddle.”

Lucas wrapped his arms around John with sudden fierceness, and his eyes filled, and for a moment and could only bury his face in the other man’s neck, blinking rapidly until it was under control. John pressed in closer too, and Lucas knew that he’d seen.

“You only see the good in people,” Lucas whispered into his ear. “That’s why I need you.”

John felt like his heart was overflowing, He wanted to pour himself all over the other man. “You have me,” he whispered back, like a promise.

Lucas squeezed him even tighter, thinking _Yes. You’re a doctor. You want to heal people. I am perfect for you then. Healing me will take a lifetime._

After a moment, Lucas twisted to bring them both more into a reclining position on the couch, the tv forgotten for a moment. He settled John into a convenient position for him, the blond head on his shoulder, one hand on Lucas’s chest, one leg thrown over his thighs. Lucas cradled his prize and kissed him on the forehead ardently several times. 

John looked up at him and Lucas bent his head lower to kiss John’s nose. “Where did you get this funny nose, hm?” he murmured. 

“My mum,” John answered. Their voices were intimately low now, their eyes locked, their hands digging into one another’s clothing, clutching.

“Yeah? Your mum?” He kissed it again.

“Where’d you get that thing?” John breathed, pressing his face to Lucas’s jaw, his eyes wandering over the sharp beak.

“My mum too.” Lucas grinned, watching John think that over and grow tactfully quiet. “Yeah, she wasn’t a pretty woman.”

John dissolved into giggles, putting his face into Lucas’s chest, and the other man grinned like he hadn’t in years. “Oh, shit,” John gasped, still shaking with laughter.

Lucas moved his arms to a different hold and squeezed again, wanting to find all the different ways he could smush John Watson against him. He smelled the blond hair, smiled at his snufflings, and then stared off into space, the smile fading.

_I have got to get him out of here,_ he thought, and wasn’t even consciously aware that somewhere in the last few weeks, his priorities had gradually changed from “Get out” to “Get John out.”

They stayed wrapped around each other like two lost souls, and only eventually did Lucas reach out for the remote and start the film again. He wrapped John up tight and dug his fingers into the blond hair. John molded himself to his captor, and they fell asleep that way during the movie. They didn’t even see the van hit the water.


	30. The Ultimate Test

They had two good days together. Two days of lounging in their pajamas, eating re-heated cafeteria food, watching movies, and love-making. John was dazzled to discover that, while Lucas was capable of absolutely brutal fucking, he was also interested in long, slow kisses, very deep ones, and tingling love-bites, and drawing out a blow-job till it was a new, agonizing form of torture. In fact, putting John in restraints and then teasing his cock till it was leaking and he was begging was apparently a specialty of his.

Lucas gloated over John, eyes not tender at all, while he teased him. He used those latex gloves, too, to finger his victim from behind slowly. And then rapidly. And then slowly again, while he licked and sucked in a desultory manner. 

“Please, please, please—“ John was chanting, nearly out of his mind.

Lucas added another finger and pushed, making John cry out hoarsely.

“You like that?” He asked teasingly, sucking for a few moments and then drawing off slowly.

John’s stomach was in knots. One of his knees was held high over his lover’s shoulder, and his thigh was trembling.

“Jesus you bastard—“

“Push down,” Lucas suggested, smirking. 

John pushed down with his hips onto the probing fingers and let out a keening note of pleasure.

Lucas sucked the swollen head of his cock for a few more seconds and then pulled off again. “I should spank your cock,” he suggested, watching John’s face.

“No, don’t… don’t do that,” John managed.

“I’ll take a ruler to it when it’s hard and slap it right here,” Lucas licked the underside from base to head and down again while John groaned. “… till it’s red. Then I’ll take a feather—“

He crooked his fingers a few times and John cried out again, twisting helplessly. Lucas lay on one of his legs, holding it down. He watched with cruel pleasure as John’s hips thumped frantically on the bed. 

“Beg,” he recommended, lowering his face onto John’s cock again, sucking it in deeply. 

John panted. “I am begging, fuck, I’m begging… oh God yes… oh God…”

Lucas twisted his fingers, plunged them in hard, and finally let John come in his mouth. John was incoherent and his muscles were locked for several agonizing seconds. His head was thrown back and his throat looked like he was dying.

Lucas jiggled the hand that was halfway up his lover’s arse, pushing it just one last bit deeper, forcing a strangled cry from his victim’s throat.

When John was finally limp and exhausted, Lucas removed his glove, uncuffed John, rolled him over and took him, carefully this time, moving very slowly, his eyes closed, his face in John’s neck, hands gentle and caressing. He had his own orgasm quietly, shuddered, and then curled down on top of John, and around him, kissing his neck and shoulders.

Then, when they could move again, they’d shower and eat, and pick through the DVDs. It was bliss for two days.

Then Lucas got a text from Mischa. _Would you be willing to run another errand for me?_

John watched as, abruptly, his lover vanished and the interrogator returned. Lucas was all business immediately. He shaved, dressed in his severest black, and was utterly distracted. Moving rapidly, he packed his phone, keys, watch, badge, and gun, his eyes focused on some distant plan. He locked up his laptop, grabbed the coat from the closet and gave John a hard look. “Don’t leave these rooms.”

“I know,” John said quietly, watching him. Lucas’s eyes checked about the room quickly, and then he was out the door. 

_Meet me in the lobby,_ Mischa instructed, and Lucas came out of the elevator to find the other man waiting with a manila folder in his hand. Together they went to the parking lot. When they reached the silver Volga, Mischa handed Lucas the keys, but did not go around to enter the passenger side. 

“I think this you must do without me,” the Russian said, watching Lucas closely. “I ask you to fly to Ankara and back. Deliver this envelope. You are courier now, see? Not a difficult task but I want someone I can trust.”

Lucas stood stunned. Mischa opened the manila folder calmly. “Here is your passport. Well, not Lucas North’s passport. You are John Bateman now. Here is the ticket to Ankara, Turkey, and you see the return date is tomorrow at 9am. Four hour flight, not bad. Here is some cash. Get a nice meal. Get a hotel room. Do not be stingy with yourself, although do not go full Saudi, yes?”

Mischa handed him another envelope. “Here is the delivery, you see an address here. Take it by hand, take it to the door. Go as soon as you land. If no one is there, wait, return, but do not leave it with anyone but the man whose name you see here. I chose an early flight to give you enough time, but this delivery is expected so I do not anticipate problems… oh… there is a small bag in the trunk so that you are not traveling without luggage. You know that makes the pilots nervous these days.”

Mischa looked at Lucas. “You understand? You are ready for the increased responsibility and trust?”

Lucas nodded silently, staring down at the passport.

Mischa smiled. “GPS is already set for the airport. You should go now.”

He stepped back, watched Lucas open the door, stare at the facility for a long moment, and then get in the car and start it up. He gave Mischa one more look, and a somber nod, and drove out of the parking lot and toward the main gate.

Mischa watched him go, putting his hands into his pockets. “Now we will see,” he said to himself lightly.

 

* * *

 

By 9pm, John was coming to terms with the idea that Lucas might not be coming back to the rooms that night. It was eerie here at night without him. John paced. He ate. He watched movies. He stared at the door. He stared out the windows. He wished there was alcohol.

He wished Lucas would come in. He felt odd pains in his stomach that seemed to be entirely emotional. He worried that something had happened to Lucas. He picked through the books. He picked through Lucas’s clothes hanging in the closet and smelled them.

He stared out the windows again, growing angry. He understood now why dogs chew on the furniture. 

He did the dishes, although there weren’t many because they’d been living like bachelors near a deli, eating from the cafeteria out of cardboard cartons that were then shoved down the trash chute.

He put in another DVD and dozed off on the couch, waiting.

By 2am, he was in bed alone, and bitter about it. Then worried again. Could something have happened to Lucas?

 

* * *

 

Lucas sat in the hotel room in a very nice Mariott in Ankara. On the table in front of him were his phone, his keys, his passport, the return ticket, and what was left of the cash. He took off the Rolex and laid it there too, so he could stare at the collection of items. The gun he’d left in the Volga at the Stavropol Airport. The envelope had been delivered without incident. How he was in his hotel room, and his hands were shaking.

_You should make a run for it. From here, you could get free. You could vanish._

He put his hands over his face, thinking of John, and wondering if he could get on that plane, go of his own free will back into Russia, back into captivity, back to the facility, back to Mischa, back to where at any time…. At ANY TIME Mischa could strip him of everything. Strip away the clothes, the keys, everything. Put him back in scrubs, put him back in a cell, give him to Oleg or Sergie or Anton, or anyone else. Make him vanish again. Flush him down the toilet.

And he was supposed to walk back into that. Because if he didn’t… John.

No more John. Literally, no more John, not for long. Mischa would hand him over to Anton with a shrug. _Lucas did not come back for you John. He left you here alone. He was finished with you, perhaps._

Lucas staggered into the bathroom and vomited into the toilet. He threw up the nice meal Mischa’d recommended he eat. He threw up the wine, he threw up the dessert. He had dry heaves for a while.

When he finally recovered, he took a hot bath and crawled into the bed. Unlike John, he slept the whole night, because he was mentally exhausted.

 

* * *

 

John prowled about the next day in worse shape than before. He was increasingly positive something had happened to Lucas. He ate breakfast, he showered even though he hated being under the water because every second he expected to see the knob turn and Lucas re-enter the rooms.

His stomach was in knots, but he shaved, and groomed himself, and put on Lucas’s red shirt and gray sweats because they smelled like him, and they were as close to normal clothes as he could get without taking any of the tailored black items in the closet. He didn’t think he should get into those. They wouldn’t fit anyway.

At noon, the door opened and John leapt up in relief and then froze. Three men entered the room, and none of them were Lucas.


	31. Mischa's Game

At noon, flight 3291 Turkish Airlines from Ankara to Stavropol was beginning its descent. Lucas North sat in first class, staring straight in front of him. The falcon could not shake free of its jesses. He would walk back into captivity, back into the facility, back into Mischa’s power. Because if he didn’t… John.

The question was never whether he had made John his own. The question was whether John had made Lucas his own, and apparently, Lucas brooded, staring at the seat in front of him… he had. He felt as though paralysis was seeping into his neck and jaw. Walking back into captivity.

Mischa might as well be standing before him with a wheelchair. _I want you to sit down here, Lucas. Give me your wrists._

He didn’t eat any breakfast because he didn’t trust that he could keep it down.

When the plane landed, Lucas walked off it like a zombie and went to the Volga, parked right where he’d left it. He drove expressionlessly back to the facility, hating himself every inch of the way. He showed his security card _(could be taken back at any time)_ and was passed through the gates.

He parked the Volga and entered the lobby, showed his card again, and was passed through. He looked around for Mischa. No Mischa. He pulled out his phone and checked for messages. No messages.

Fine. All he wanted was to go back to his rooms and to John. He rode the elevator up with increasing impatience, and when it opened, he strode out quickly, took about five steps and stopped.

The door to his rooms was standing open. His stomach plummeted.

Lucas ran into his rooms, did a lightning fast search, and whipped out his phone.

_WHERE IS JOHN?_

The reply was immediate, as if it had been typed out before hand.

_I am a little worried. Sergei said he wanted to take John for a walk on the estuary. He said the view was liberating. But this was some hours ago. Are they not back?_

“Fuck,” Lucas breathed. He knew exactly the spot Mischa was referring to, and flew back down the hall and into the elevator. He pounded the button and then stood, pale and sweating, while the elevator descended. He felt for the gun in the hidden breast pocket.

When the doors opened, Lucas shot out of them and walked quickly toward the cafeteria, eschewing the lobby. Quickest route to the estuary was through the cafeteria.

Lucas emerged from the side door and headed straight for the dunes where the road curved. His stomach was up in his chest and his head was throbbing with rage and fright. _I’ll kill that fucker, I swear to God I’ll kill that motherfucking piece of shit_ his mind babbled.

When he got close enough to the dunes, it was clear they were deserted. He ran to them anyway, hoping to find some clue. And there it was, in the sand. A manila folder in a plastic bag. Lucas snatched it up but before he could pull it out, his phone vibrated. He checked it.

_Just park next to the Red Fiat again. I am busy in the gym._

An innocuous sounding message. As if giving him directions where to leave the Volga in the facility parking lot. Lucas turned, remembering that from the treadmills they had looked down together onto the estuary. He looked up and saw Mischa on one of the treadmills, calmly watching him from the 7th story window.

Lucas held up the phone and Mischa jerked his head toward the north. Go.

Cutting back through the facility, Lucas did his best to look calm. He showed his security badge again, wondering if he would be stopped, but he wasn’t. He trotted back out to the Volga and drove back out of the gates, heading for the parking garage where they’d dropped off the body.

He appreciated now that Mischa had made him drive. Otherwise he probably would not have been able to find it again. He couldn’t use the GPS for it; he didn’t know the address. He only knew that they had gone to the church, this way, and then, down here… yes, turn by the large blue building… and then…. There was the long stretch by the park with all the swings… yes… and eventually, Lucas found the parking garage.

He drove in and wound up and up to the deserted level. There was indeed the red Fiat. He parked next to it and leapt out, looking wildly around. No John. He paced about the cars for a moment, frantic, furious... and then realized that the boot of the Fiat was slightly ajar.

_Oh God._ His heart sank into his stomach. _God, don’t let John be in there._

He stepped to it slowly, and carefully lifted the lid of the boot. It was empty. With a sigh, he lowered it again, and then peered into the car. No one. Nothing.

Suddenly concerned, he popped the lid of the boot to the Volga and looked, but there was no one in there either.

He chewed on his thumb.

His phone vibrated. _Did you enjoy your trip?_

What the fuck? _No,_ he texted back, hoping this was a code and he’d answered correctly.

_What a shame. You should see RusOtel._

The top level! Of course, Mischa had taken him there. Mischa did nothing without a reason… Lucas ran up the stairs to the top level of the parking garage, and there, at last, he found John. 

And Sergei. 

They were near the edge. Sergei had his back to it, playing with his phone, leaning against the edge, which was easily waist high. John was crumpled at his feet. Not dead, just sitting, knees curled up defensively, back to the wall, head down. Hand cuffed behind him. Face bruised.

Lucas strode toward them, the peacoat whipping back, and Sergei looked up.

“Well fuck me, I owe Mischa 5000 Roubli,” he said in Russian, with a nasty grin.

He looked down at John and kicked him. “Look, piglet.” He said in his guttural English. “Your sticker came back for you after all—“

John looked up at Lucas and his face was bloody and bruised. Lucas looked down at John’s face, pulled the gun out of his breast pocket, and shot Sergei five times in the chest. 

“Fuck!!” John shouted in alarm, rolling over and curling up tighter.

Sergei fell next to him, and Lucas stood over him and calmly put the last bullet in his forehead, just to be sure.

John gaped at him in shock.

Lucas put the gun back in his peacoat, leaned over and picked Sergei’s body up, throwing it over his shoulder with a grunt. “Stay here,” he said to John tonelessly, and John watched in astonishment as Lucas carried the body to the stairs.

Down one level, Lucas tossed the body in boot of the red Fiat and slammed it shut. Then he shucked off the bloody peacoat, gun and all, and dropped it in the boot of the Volga and slammed it shut as well. Then he walked calmly back up to the top level, helped the traumatized Dr. Watson to his feet, and checked his hands. They weren’t cuffed, they were tied with rope. Tightly. Lucas simmered, wanting to kill Sergei all over again.

Picking the knot took a few minutes, and he had to insert one of his keys into the rope and work it for a while, but it finally came loose and he was able to pull John into a decent embrace. John buried his damaged face in Lucas’s shirt for a moment and they just stood there in the cold wind atop the parking garage.

“Come on,” Lucas said gruffly, after a moment. He led John down to the Volga, his eyes darting all around for any further threat to his prize. When he opened the passenger door to put John in, his eyes fell on the manila folder. He’d forgotten it completely in his rage to find John. He snatched it off the seat so John could slide in and sit.

Lucas came around to the driver’s side, got in, and opened the folder. John found some napkins in the side pocket and pulled down the visor, trying to clean the blood off his face with shaking hands. He was obviously trying to remain calm, but after a moment, he realized that Lucas was staring down at the folder in his hands, not moving.

John looked at him. “Is something wrong? I mean—more than already?” 

Lucas was breathing fast. After a moment, he handed John the contents of the folder. Two passports. Two airline tickets. To London. And some cash. They stared at each other.

_You should hurry_ Mischa texted.

Lucas threw the car into reverse and backed out with a squeal. “Put on your seatbelt,” he said to John. “We’re going.”

And they went.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I need to write a Part 2.


End file.
